eclipse-theia/theia

simplify checking monaco typings

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#7,261 opened on Mar 3, 2020

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 (3 comments) (0 reactions) (0 assignees)TypeScript (18,676 stars) (2,478 forks)batch import
enhancementhelp wantedmonaco

Description

Currently we expose internals of Monaco manually which is quite troublesome to check on each update, since we expose more and more Monaco APIs. I believe @RomanNikitenko can second it after doing https://github.com/eclipse-theia/theia/pull/7149.

Even if we do https://github.com/eclipse-theia/theia/issues/7100 and can start upgrading to latest Monaco immediately and have more tests, it would still require quite some manual effort.

I'm not sure how it can be done but it would be good automate as well. I had 2 ideas in mind:

  • try to use Monaco via esm, not amd, in this case there are esm js files in monaco distribution and we could try to generate d.ts files from them. Not sure whether it is feasible, there seem to be some tool which can derive typings: https://github.com/Microsoft/dts-gen. It will increase build time but maybe reduce final output since monaco will be part of bundle.js also we don't need hack Monaco amd loading as now.
  • don't use Monaco, but have own distribution of editor layer from VS Code, basically grab ts files and put them in npm package, then compile them via webpack in Theia. Drawbacks that these APIs are not stable at all compare to published monaco.d.ts.

Contributor guide

Tech stack
typescript
Domain
frontend
Issue type
refactor
DifficultyEstimated implementation difficulty for a new contributor, from 1 for very small changes to 5 for expert-level work.
3
Estimated timeA rough time range for an experienced contributor to investigate, implement, test, and prepare a pull request.
1-2 days
Activity statusHow available the issue appears right now: fresh, active, stale, blocked, or waiting on maintainer input.
stale
ClarityHow clearly the issue explains the expected change, acceptance criteria, and next step.
mostly clear
Prerequisites
TypeScriptMonaco EditorWebpackd.ts generation
Newbie friendlinessA 1-100 score estimating how approachable this issue is for first-time contributors.
20
Research direction
Investigate two approaches: (1) Using Monaco via ESM and deriving type definitions with dts gen; evaluate feasibility and impact on build time. (2) Creating a custom editor layer from VS Code source files, compiling with webpack. Assess stability and maintenance overhead. Reference related PR #7149 and issue #7100.