command-pal

⌨ The hackable command palette for the web, inspired by Visual Studio Code.

Configure custom commands with custom keyboard shortcuts!

Demos

Benefit's of Command Palettes

Ease of use
- Simply 1 keyboard shortcut to remember
- Fuzzy search allows you to find commands easily
Speed
- Keyboard makes it fast to access any command/function
- Fuzzy search allows for quick ordering of commands
- Efficient to find a commands that you used once a long time ago
Discoverability
- You can scroll down the entire list of commands
- Find commands by simply searching the Command palette
- Tips and functions can be given to you as you type

Features

JS framework agnostic (can be attached to any site)
Keyboard first control (shortcuts configurable)
Custom commands
Dynamically Add/Remove commands
Nested commands
Fuzzy text matching (fuse.js)
Themeable (theme-light.css and theme-dark.css included)
Mobile friendly (button in bottom-left)

Why?

Command Palettes have alwyas impressed me with how easy they are to use and develop for. I rarely see them on the web platform, so I thought I'd give it a shot.

Get Started

Install

Either install from npm

yarn add command-pal

Or use the script tag

<script src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/npm/command-pal"></script>

Usage - Simple

const c = new CommandPal({
  hotkey: "ctrl+space",
  commands: [
    {
      name: "Send Message",
      shortcut: "ctrl+m",
      handler: () => alert("Send Message"),
    },
    {
      name: "Search Contacts",
      handler: () => alert("Searching contacts..."),
    },
    {
      name: "Goto Profile",
      shortcut: "ctrl+4",
      handler: () => window.location.hash = "profile",
    },
  ],
});
c.start();

Usage - Avanced

const c = new CommandPal({
  hotkey: "ctrl+space",
  commands: [
    {
      name: "Change Language",
      children: [
        {
          name: "English",
          handler: () => alert("Changing to English")
        },
        {
          name: "Spanglish",
          handler: () => alert("Changing to Spanglish")
        }
      ]
    },
    {
      name: "Goto About",
      handler: () => window.location.hash = "about",
    },
  ],
});
c.start();

API

CommandPal instance

const c = new CommandPal({
  hotkey: "ctrl+space",  // Launcher shortcut
  hotkeysGlobal: true,       // Makes shortcut keys work in any <textarea>, <input> or <select>
  commands: [
    // Commands go here
  ]
});
// Start the instance
c.start()
// Destroy the instance
c.destroy()

Subscribe to events

There's a few events that can be subscribed to during command-pal's execution.

// When a command is executed
c.subscribe("exec", (e) => { console.log("exec", { e }); });
// On TextChanged
c.subscribe("textChanged", (e) => { console.log("textChanged", { e }); });
// When a command palette is opened
c.subscribe("opened", (e) => { console.log("opened", { e }); });
// When a command palette is closed
c.subscribe("closed", (e) => { console.log("closed", { e }); });

Command Item

{
  // Required name of command (displayed)
  name: "Open Messages",
  // Required name of command (displayed)
  description: "View all messages in inbox",
  // Shortcut of command
  shortcut: "ctrl+3",
  // Callback function of the command to execute
  handler: (e) => {
    // DO SOMETHING
  }
  // Child commands which can be executed
  children: [...]
},

Command Item Child

Note: Child commands cannot have shortcuts.

{
  // Required name of command (displayed)
  name: "Open Messages",
  // Required name of command (displayed)
  description: "View all messages in inbox",
  // Callback function of the command to execute
  handler: (e) => {
    // DO SOMETHING
  }
},

Add/Remove Command's At Runtime

The command list is an observed array, which means you can modify it even after it's instantiated. The following snippet shows how commands can be dynamically added during runtime.

const commands = [
  {
    name: "Add Command to List",
    handler: () => {
      commands.push({
        name: 'New Command',
        handler: () => {
          // Do something
        },
      });
    },
  },
];
const c = new CommandPal({
  hotkey: "ctrl+space",
  commands: commands,
});
c.start();

Local Development

To develop on command-pal simply clone, install and run

npm run dev

Then the following link:

http://localhost:5005/cp-advanced/local-dev.html

Have a go, PR's and issues always welcome.

Prior Art

Many applications have implemented this before, here's a few. My favourite implementation is the VScode, which is the main influence for this project.

Editors

Misc

Cheap and reliable Node.js hosting starts at $3/month, and $1/month static HTML hosting

benwinding / command-pal

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