Chapter 1: Getting Started
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
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
Appendix D: Upgrading to 1.0 APIs
Appendix E: Atom server-side APIs
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Atom Packages
First we'll start with the Atom package system. As we mentioned previously, Atom itself is a very basic core of functionality that ships with a number of useful packages that add new features like the Tree View and the Settings View.
In fact, there are more than 80 packages that comprise all of the functionality that is available in Atom by default. For example, the Welcome screen that you see when you first start Atom, the spell checker, the themes and the Fuzzy Finder are all packages that are separately maintained and all use the same APIs that you have access to, as we'll see in great detail in Hacking Atom.
This means that packages can be incredibly powerful and can change everything from the very look and feel of the entire interface to the basic operation of even core functionality.
In order to install a new package, you can use the Install tab in the now familiar Settings View. Open up the Settings View using Cmd+,Ctrl+,, click on the "Install" tab and type your search query into the box under Install Packages.
The packages listed here have been published to https://atom.io/packages which is the official registry for Atom packages. Searching on the Settings View will go to the Atom package registry and pull in anything that matches your search terms.
All of the packages will come up with an "Install" button. Clicking that will download the package and install it. Your editor will now have the functionality that the package provides.
Package Settings
Once a package is installed in Atom, it will show up in the Settings View under the "Packages" tab, along with all the preinstalled packages that come with Atom. To filter the list in order to find one, you can type into search box directly under the "Installed Packages" heading.
Clicking on the "Settings" button for a package will give you the settings screen for that package specifically. Here you have the option of changing some of the default variables for the package, seeing what all the command keybindings are, disabling the package temporarily, looking at the source code, seeing the current version of the package, reporting issues and uninstalling the package.
If a new version of any of your packages is released, Atom will automatically detect it and you can upgrade the package from either this screen or from the "Updates" tab. This helps you easily keep all your installed packages up to date.
Atom Themes
You can also find and install new themes for Atom from the Settings View. These can be either UI themes or syntax themes and you can search for them from the "Install" tab, just like searching for new packages. Make sure to press the "Themes" toggle next to the search box.
Clicking on the theme title will take you to a profile page for the theme on atom.io, which often has a screenshot of the theme. This way you can see what it looks like before installing it.
Clicking on "Install" will install the theme and make it available in the Theme dropdowns as we saw in Changing the Theme.
Command Line
You can also install packages or themes from the command line using apm.
Check that you have apm installed by running the following command in your terminal:
apm help install
You should see a message print out with details about the apm install command.
If you do not, see the Installing Atom section for instructions on how to install the atom and apm commands for your system.
You can also install packages by using the apm install command:
-
apm install <package_name>to install the latest version. -
apm install <package_name>@<package_version>to install a specific version.
For example apm install emmet@0.1.5 installs the 0.1.5 release of the Emmet package.
You can also use apm to find new packages to install. If you run apm search, you can search the package registry for a search term.
apm search coffee Search Results For 'coffee' (29) ├── build-coffee Atom Build provider for coffee, compiles CoffeeScript (1160 downloads, 2 stars) ├── scallahan-coffee-syntax A coffee inspired theme from the guys over at S.CALLAHAN (183 downloads, 0 stars) ├── coffee-paste Copy/Paste As : Js ➤ Coffee / Coffee ➤ Js (902 downloads, 4 stars) ├── atom-coffee-repl Coffee REPL for Atom Editor (894 downloads, 2 stars) ├── coffee-navigator Code navigation panel for Coffee Script (3493 downloads, 22 stars) ... ├── language-iced-coffeescript Iced coffeescript for atom (202 downloads, 1 star) └── slontech-syntax Dark theme for web developers ( HTML, CSS/LESS, PHP, MYSQL, javascript, AJAX, coffee, JSON ) (2018 downloads, 3 stars)
You can use apm view to see more information about a specific package.
apm view build-coffee build-coffee ├── 0.6.4 ├── https://github.com/idleberg/atom-build-coffee ├── Atom Build provider for coffee, compiles CoffeeScript ├── 1152 downloads └── 2 stars > Run `apm install build-coffee` to install this package.