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Chapter 1: Getting Started

  • Why Atom?
  • Installing Atom
  • Atom Basics
  • Summary

Chapter 2: Using Atom

  • Atom Packages
  • Moving in Atom
  • Atom Selections
  • Editing and Deleting Text
  • Find and Replace
  • Snippets
  • Autocomplete
  • Folding
  • Panes
  • Pending Pane Items
  • Grammar
  • Version Control in Atom
  • GitHub package
  • Writing in Atom
  • Basic Customization
  • Summary

Chapter 3: Hacking Atom

  • Tools of the Trade
  • The Init File
  • Package: Word Count
  • Package: Modifying Text
  • Package: Active Editor Info
  • Creating a Theme
  • Creating a Grammar
  • Creating a Legacy TextMate Grammar
  • Publishing
  • Iconography
  • Debugging
  • Writing specs
  • Handling URIs
  • Cross-Platform Compatibility
  • Converting from TextMate
  • Hacking on Atom Core
  • Contributing to Official Atom Packages
  • Creating a Fork of a Core Package in atom/atom
  • Maintaining a Fork of a Core Package in atom/atom
  • Summary

Chapter 4: Behind Atom

  • Configuration API
  • Keymaps In-Depth
  • Scoped Settings, Scopes and Scope Descriptors
  • Serialization in Atom
  • Developing Node Modules
  • Interacting With Other Packages Via Services
  • Maintaining Your Packages
  • How Atom Uses Chromium Snapshots
  • Summary

Reference: API

  • AtomEnvironment
  • BufferedNodeProcess
  • BufferedProcess
  • Clipboard
  • Color
  • CommandRegistry
  • CompositeDisposable
  • Config
  • ContextMenuManager
  • Cursor
  • Decoration
  • DeserializerManager
  • Directory
  • DisplayMarker
  • DisplayMarkerLayer
  • Disposable
  • Dock
  • Emitter
  • File
  • GitRepository
  • Grammar
  • GrammarRegistry
  • Gutter
  • HistoryManager
  • KeymapManager
  • LayerDecoration
  • MarkerLayer
  • MenuManager
  • Notification
  • NotificationManager
  • Package
  • PackageManager
  • Pane
  • Panel
  • PathWatcher
  • Point
  • Project
  • Range
  • ScopeDescriptor
  • Selection
  • StyleManager
  • Task
  • TextBuffer
  • TextEditor
  • ThemeManager
  • TooltipManager
  • ViewRegistry
  • Workspace
  • WorkspaceCenter

Appendix A: Resources

  • Glossary

Appendix B: FAQ

  • Is Atom open source?
  • What does Atom cost?
  • What platforms does Atom run on?
  • How can I contribute to Atom?
  • Why does Atom collect usage data?
  • Atom in the cloud?
  • What's the difference between an IDE and an editor?
  • How can I tell if subpixel antialiasing is working?
  • Why is Atom deleting trailing whitespace? Why is there a newline at the end of the file?
  • What does Safe Mode do?
  • I have a question about a specific Atom community package. Where is the best place to ask it?
  • I’m using an international keyboard and keys that use AltGr or Ctrl+Alt aren’t working
  • I’m having a problem with Julia! What do I do?
  • I’m getting an error about a “self-signed certificate”. What do I do?
  • I’m having a problem with PlatformIO! What do I do?
  • How do I make Atom recognize a file with extension X as language Y?
  • How do I make the Welcome screen stop showing up?
  • How do I preview web page changes automatically?
  • How do I accept input from my program or script when using the script package?
  • I am unable to update to the latest version of Atom on macOS. How do I fix this?
  • I’m trying to change my syntax colors from styles.less, but it isn’t working!
  • How do I build or execute code I've written in Atom?
  • How do I uninstall Atom on macOS?
  • macOS Mojave font rendering change
  • Why does macOS say that Atom wants to access my calendar, contacts, photos, etc.?
  • How do I turn on line wrap?
  • The menu bar disappeared, how do I get it back?
  • How do I use a newline in the result of find and replace?
  • What is this line on the right in the editor view?

Appendix C: Shadow DOM

  • Removing Shadow DOM styles

Appendix D: Upgrading to 1.0 APIs

  • Upgrading Your Package
  • Upgrading Your UI Theme Or Package Selectors
  • Upgrading Your Syntax Theme

Appendix E: Atom server-side APIs

  • Atom package server API
  • Atom update server API

  • mac
  • windows
  • linux
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Configuration API

Reading Config Settings

If you are writing a package that you want to make configurable, you'll need to read config settings via the atom.config global. You can read the current value of a namespaced config key with atom.config.get:

// read a value with `config.get`
if (atom.config.get("editor.showInvisibles")) {
  this.showInvisibles()
}

Or you can subscribe via atom.config.observe to track changes from any view object.

const {View} = require('space-pen')

class MyView extends View {
  function attached() {
    this.fontSizeObserveSubscription =
      atom.config.observe('editor.fontSize', (newValue, {previous}) => {
        this.adjustFontSize(newValue)
      })
  }

  function detached() {
    this.fontSizeObserveSubscription.dispose()
  }
}

The atom.config.observe method will call the given callback immediately with the current value for the specified key path, and it will also call it in the future whenever the value of that key path changes. If you only want to invoke the callback the next time the value changes, use atom.config.onDidChange instead.

Subscription methods return Disposable objects that can be used to unsubscribe. Note in the example above how we save the subscription to the @fontSizeObserveSubscription instance variable and dispose of it when the view is detached. To group multiple subscriptions together, you can add them all to a CompositeDisposable that you dispose when the view is detached.

Writing Config Settings

The atom.config database is populated on startup from ~/.atom/config.cson%USERPROFILE%\.atom\config.cson, but you can programmatically write to it with atom.config.set:

// basic key update
atom.config.set("core.showInvisibles", true)

If you're exposing package configuration via specific key paths, you'll want to associate them with a schema in your package's main module. Read more about schemas in the Config API documentation.

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