I took a class for web development last year that strongly encouraged students to use Notepad++ for developing sites. I don’t mind using Notepad++ but when you compare it to Visual Studio Code, it somewhat primitive. There was one functionality about it that I kind of missed in Visual Studio Code, however: the the FTP plugin.
However: this does not mean I cannot do FTP right within Visual Studio Code. I found a plugin/extension called ftp-simple.
It is very simple.
Press F1
Type ftp-simple
Select the config option
Input the necessary information
You can leave the password field blank as it will prompt you for the password.
If it cannot connect, try changing the port to 22. Be sure that the host field does not have a slash as that may have some impact.
Connecting to the (s)ftp site and opening a file
- Press F1
- Type ftp-simple
- Select Open
- Navigate to the file you’d like to open
If you find yourself in my position where initial directory is not your typical working directory, you will have to navigate to it. In my case, I had to go to /home/ and then to my user directory. It might be completely different for you.
In the future, you can edit the config file and set the path.
Final thoughts
The ftp-simple plugin gets the job done (for me!) but it kind of sucks to use. It is nowhere near as convenient as Npp-FTP ftp plugin in Notepad++ that I was used to using. For one, it is a lot easier to navigate that plugin, and it is also easier to configure.
This being said: Visual Studio Code is ultimately better than Notepad++. The plugin that I referenced for Notepad++ as of writing appears to be only available for the 32 bit version of Notepad++. Plus Notepad++ cannot be run on Linux-based systems without use of Wine or virtualization.
This isn’t exactly the end of the world: one could simply use something like FileZilla in conjunction with Visual Studio Code for website development.
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