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Snippets package

Expand snippets matching the current prefix with tab in Atom.

To add your own snippets, select the Atom > Snippets... menu option if you're using macOS, or the File > Snippets... menu option if you're using Windows, or the Edit > Snippets... menu option if you are using Linux.

Snippet Format

Snippets files are stored in a package's snippets/ folder and also loaded from ~/.atom/snippets.cson. They can be either .json or .cson file types.

'.source.js':
  'console.log':
    'prefix': 'log'
    'body': 'console.log(${1:"crash"});$2'

The outermost keys are the selectors where these snippets should be active, prefixed with a period (.) (details below).

The next level of keys are the snippet names.

Under each snippet name is a prefix that should trigger the snippet and a body to insert when the snippet is triggered.

$ followed by a number are the tabs stops which can be cycled between by pressing tab once a snippet has been triggered.

The above example adds a log snippet to JavaScript files that would expand to.

console.log("crash");

The string "crash" would be initially selected and pressing tab again would place the cursor after the ;

Optional parameters

These parameters are meant to provide extra information about your snippet to autocomplete-plus.

leftLabel will add text to the left part of the autocomplete results box.
leftLabelHTML will overwrite what's in leftLabel and allow you to use a bit of CSS such as color.
rightLabelHTML. By default, in the right part of the results box you will see the name of the snippet. When using rightLabelHTML the name of the snippet will no longer be displayed, and you will be able to use a bit of CSS.
description will add text to a description box under the autocomplete results list.
descriptionMoreURL URL to the documentation of the snippet.

autocomplete-description

Example:

'.source.js':
  'console.log':
    'prefix': 'log'
    'body': 'console.log(${1:"crash"});$2'
    'description': 'Output data to the console'
    'rightLabelHTML': '<span style="color:#ff0">JS</span>'

Determining the correct scope for a snippet

The outmost key of a snippet is the "scope" that you want the descendent snippets to be available in. The key should be prefixed with a period (text.html.basic => .text.html.basic). You can find out the correct scope by opening the Settings (cmd-, on macOS) and selecting the corresponding Language [xxx] package, e.g. for Language Html:

Screenshot of Language Html settings

If it's difficult to determine the package handling the file type in question (for example, for .md-documents), you can also proceed as following. Put your cursor in a file in which you want the snippet to be available, open the Command Palette (cmd-shift-p), and run the Editor: Log Cursor Scope command. This will trigger a notification which will contain a list of scopes. The first scope that's listed is the scope for that language. Here are some examples: source.coffee, text.plain, text.html.basic.

Snippet syntax

This package supports a subset of the features of TextMate snippets, documented here.

The following features are not yet supported:

Variables
Interpolated shell code
Conditional insertions in transformations

Multi-line Snippet Body

You can also use multi-line syntax using """ for larger templates:

'.source.js':
  'if, else if, else':
    'prefix': 'ieie'
    'body': """
      if (${1:true}) {
        $2
      } else if (${3:false}) {
        $4
      } else {
        $5
      }
    """

Escaping Characters

Including a literal closing brace inside the text provided by a snippet's tab stop will close that tab stop early. To prevent that, escape the brace with two backslashes, like so:

'.source.js':
  'function':
    'prefix': 'funct'
    'body': """
      ${1:function () {
        statements;
      \\}
      this line is also included in the snippet tab;
      }
      """

Multiple snippets for the same scope

Snippets for the same scope must be placed within the same key. See this section of the Atom Flight Manual for more information.

atom / snippets

readme