Compile any instance of a file name, regardless of folder it is in

[kevadamson]

Is this possible? For example I have many instances of "layout.less" in various folders. I would like them to compile each time another less file is saved, without having to manually add each instance to "main:". Does that make sense?

[mrcrowl]

That depends. If the "layout.less" files are the only less files that you want to compile, then this can be achieved by using the main setting in the settings.json file:

{    
    "less.compile": {
        "main": ["${workspaceRoot}/folder1/layout.less", "${workspaceRoot}/folder2/layout.less"]
    }
}

If you have other less files that you want to auto-compile, then the situation is somewhat more complicated, unfortunately.

When a main file is specified at the settings level, then it applies to all less files within your project.

[kevadamson]

Thanks for the speedy response. I could, in theory, end up with a lot of main declarations (the project I'm working on could have a lot of "skins"), so I was hoping there might be a declaration like:

"main": ["${workspaceRoot}/*/*/layout.less"]

Where * is any named folder. So I don't have to repeat each time. Make sense?

[mrcrowl]

Yeah, it makes sense. Unfortunately not supported, and I'm unlikely to implement because using glob patterns will incur a search cost every time a less file is saved (... or alternatively, easyless would need to keep track of all files named layout.less that match the pattern).

You might be interested in a more advanced solution such as gulp-less or webpack.