[feature] Command mode by ckardaris · Pull Request #4880 · philc/vimium

ckardaris · 2026-03-24T20:04:30Z

Introduce command mode in the omni bar.

Features:

Launch with ':' (default key mapping).
Support prefix counts.
Show all commands (even mapped ones).
Show all commands as specified (with any options) in user defined key mappings.
Show keys for mapped commands, similarly to the help page.

Fix:

Fix collection of unit tests in subdirectories.

Other:

Revise 'noRepeat' attribute for all commands.

Description

Good evening, this MR implements feature request #4103.

I have tried to implement this feature as cleanly as possible.
I understand that this is quite a big patch, so I expect some changes based on reviewer suggestions,
but I think that it is working nicely.
I tried to add some tests, as well, but I am afraid I am not very familiar with shoulda and puppeteer,
so I am not sure if I have followed best practices and if I am inside the general spirit of the Vimium tests.

I am looking forward to your feedback and hope to be merging this soon.

philc · 2026-03-24T22:43:39Z

Whoa, very exciting! Thank you for the PR. I'll take this for a spin in the next few days.

philc

Hey @ckardaris, I tried this out and it works well. I've left some initial comments on the code. For the UX:

We should remove "command" as a prefix in the UI. One could argue it should be removed for bookmarks and tabs too when using their specific selection UIs, but that can be debated offline. Since commands can only be searched when using the command search UI, it just adds clutter to the UI.
The styles of the keybindings in this dialog needs to be improved. The Vomnibar's background colors are different than the help dialog's, so it doesn't look good, at least in dark mode. I can fiddle with it post-merge.
Hitting enter when there are no completions should do nothing, rather than submit the query to the default search engine. This is an existing bug, and also affects the bookmark and tabs listing.

philc · 2026-03-28T05:31:21Z

background_scripts/completion/completers.js

  tabId;
  // Whether this is a suggestion provided by a user's custom search engine.
  isCustomSearch;
+  // Suggestion in 'command' mode.


Use double quotes here, and throughout all the comments, to match the existing style.

philc · 2026-03-28T05:31:33Z

background_scripts/completion/completers.js

  isCustomSearch;
+  // Suggestion in 'command' mode.
+  // command = {
+  //   // 'RegistryEntry' to execute the command in 'NormalMode.commandHandler'.


This comment shouldn't be double commented.

philc · 2026-03-28T05:31:58Z

background_scripts/completion/completers.js

    const relevancyHtml = showRelevancy
-      ? `<span class='relevancy'>${this.computeRelevancy()}</span>`
+      ? `
+    <span class='relevancy'>${this.computeRelevancy()}</span>`


Why is there a newline added here?

I have reverted. It was an attempt to unify the generated HTML and better format it, but I agree that maybe I should not touch unrelated code and keep the scope narrower.

philc · 2026-03-28T05:33:09Z

background_scripts/completion/completers.js

-   <span class="title">${this.highlightQueryTerms(Utils.escapeHtml(this.title))}</span>
-   ${relevancyHtml}
- </div>\
+      this.html = `


This looks like an unrelated whitespace change (indentation and additional line wrapping).

Same. I have reverted to keep the scope narrower.

philc · 2026-03-28T05:34:30Z

background_scripts/completion/completers.js

+  </div>
+`;
+    } else if (this.command) {
+      // Key mappings containing key-modifiers are represented in the form of '<modifier-key>'


key modifiers should be two words.

philc · 2026-03-28T05:56:59Z

tests/unit_tests/vomnibar_page_test.js

+  CommandCompleter,
+  MultiCompleter,
+  Suggestion,
+} from "../../background_scripts/completion/completers.js";


Having each import on its own line does not match the style in the rest of the codebase.

I am afraid this is automatically formatted that way.

philc · 2026-03-28T05:57:30Z

tests/unit_tests/vomnibar_page_test.js

    assert.equal("constructor ", ui.input.value);
  });
+
+  should("fill the suggestions list with correct HTML", async () => {


This test is too verbose, and it's too fragile -- changing any part of the HTML will break this test.

I was mostly interested about testing the key block. I have simplified the test.

philc · 2026-03-28T05:59:23Z

make.js

  // Import every test file.
  const dir = path.join(projectPath, "tests/unit_tests");
-  const files = Array.from(Deno.readDirSync(dir)).map((f) => f.name).sort();
+  const files = collectFiles(dir);


Nice find. That seems like a bad error =)

But it's not related to this PR; please split out into a separate PR.

Done. #4882.

philc · 2026-03-28T06:00:57Z

background_scripts/completion/completers.js

+      (await chrome.storage.session.get("commandToOptionsToKeys")).commandToOptionsToKeys;
+
+    // Create a RegistryEntry for the default action (no options specified) of a command.
+    const createUnboundRegistryEntry = (command) => {


I haven't looked closely at why this is needed, but it would be nice if we didn't have to have this.

This is done this way because the main loop uses commandsToOptionsToKeys to gather available commands. This means that non-mapped commands are not collected even though they are available. createUnboundRegistryEntry fills this gap.

To be honest this part of the implementation seemed quite obscure to me and it also made for some weird test programming that you have already commented on in the other threads.

I am open to suggestions if I am missing an obvious and easier way to do this.

philc · 2026-03-28T06:02:11Z

content_scripts/mode_normal.js

    });
+
+    // Listen and handle 'command' events coming from the background and
+    // originally sent from the omnibar page.


This comment is wrapped too aggressively.

ckardaris · 2026-03-28T16:25:09Z

Hello @philc. Thanks for the review. I am in the process of going over it and fixing stuff based on your suggestions.

* We should remove "command" as a prefix in the UI. One could argue it should be removed for bookmarks and tabs too when using their specific selection UIs, but that can be debated offline. Since commands can only be searched when using the command search UI, it just adds clutter to the UI.

I also agree that it is "weird" to see the same "source" for non-omni modes. Would the proposal of #4481 be interesting? I think we could the best of both worlds considering that we would still have an indicator of the current mode of operation.

* The styles of the keybindings in this dialog needs to be improved. The Vomnibar's background colors are different than the help dialog's, so it doesn't look good, at least in dark mode. I can fiddle with it post-merge.

Thanks. Would it maybe make sense to do a style update and unify the background with the help page, so that both modes work as expected and the CSS styling can keep being shared?

* Hitting enter when there are no completions should do nothing, rather than submit the query to the default search engine. This is an existing bug, and also affects the bookmark and tabs listing.

I have pushed a one-line fix for this. Let me know if you want to keep it in this PR or you would prefer to split it, since it is kind of a bigger (conceptually) change.

Introduce command mode in the omni bar. Features: - Launch with ':' (default key mapping). - Support prefix counts. - Show all commands (even mapped ones). - Show all commands as specified (with any options) in user defined key mappings. - Show keys for mapped commands, similarly to the help page. Other: - Revise 'noRepeat' attribute for all commands. Disable ctrl-enter for command mode

"Enter" on no-selection is a no-op for all completers apart from "omni".

Simplify suggestion de-duplication code.

ckardaris · 2026-03-28T18:17:00Z

Hello @philc. Thanks again for looking at this PR. I have finished addressing the first round of review. Let me know if you have any additional remarks.

ckardaris added a commit to ckardaris/vimium that referenced this pull request Mar 26, 2026

Cherry-pick test fixes from philc#4880

c75c88c

philc requested changes Mar 28, 2026

View reviewed changes

ckardaris mentioned this pull request Mar 28, 2026

[fix] Test configuration #4882

Open

ckardaris force-pushed the vimium-4103-command-line-mode branch 2 times, most recently from eef7f95 to 73e6696 Compare March 28, 2026 15:52

ckardaris added 4 commits March 28, 2026 17:29

Review resolution: philc 1.0

713a239

Review resolution: philc 1.1

19d6cc5

Review resolution: philc 1.2

b08a12b

"Enter" on no-selection is a no-op for all completers apart from "omni".

ckardaris force-pushed the vimium-4103-command-line-mode branch from 0861582 to b08a12b Compare March 28, 2026 16:29

ckardaris added 3 commits March 28, 2026 18:20

Review resolution: philc 1.3

1ed1fea

Review resolution: philc 1.4

29d205a

Simplify suggestion de-duplication code.

Review resolution: philc 1.5

1664c8d

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ckardaris commented Mar 24, 2026

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ckardaris commented Mar 28, 2026 •

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