Semantic highlighting in source code

[bruno-medeiros]

Highlight source code according to semantic properties, example:

-function declaration names -type declaration names -variable names

[10liuguang01]

Come on

[rsippl]

+1

This lacking feature is the only reason that keeps me from switching from IntelliJ Idea.

[bruno-medeiros]

How does the semantic highlighting work in IntelliJ, which semantic elements are highlighted?

[rsippl]

Here's what it looks like:

[rsippl]

Here's the plugin code (not sure if it helps)

[bruno-medeiros]

Yeah, I know about go-lang-idea-plugin already. I'm not sure I quite understand the logic of that highlighting though. Println is a function and is highlighted red, same as RGBA which is a struct. At the same time, the methods ScaleBy and Distance are not highlighted...

[sanmai]

Here's how it looks like in Eclipse's PDT:

(note the cursor position)

[rillig]

IntelliJ knows the following token categories for coloring Go programs:

• Bad character
• Block comment
• Braces
• Brackets
• Builtin function
• Builtin type
• Colon
• Comma
• Dot
• Exported function
• Function parameter
• Identifier
• Keyword
• Label
• Line comment
• Local {constant, function, variable}
• Method receiver
• Number
• Operator
• Package exported {constant, interface, struct, variable}
• Package local {constant, interface, struct, variable}
• Parentheses
• Scope declared variable
• Semicolon
• String
• Struct exported member
• Struct local member
• Type reference
• Type specification

Some additional categories I find useful are:

• Local variable declaration
• Local variable use
• Local variable overwrite
• Control flow keyword (if, for, switch, return, goto)
• Anonymous variable (_)
• Imported package (e.g. fmt)

When you install IntelliJ, you can find many more token categories in the Settings dialog (Alt+Ctrl+S), section Editor > Colors & Fonts. Note the General section, which has entries for “Unused symbol” and similar things.