1. Visual Studio Code Align Codes
2. Vs Code Align Text
3. Microsoft Studios Visual Code
4. Visual Studio Code Align Code Shortcut

Visual Studio Code Align Codes

Code alignment is the practice of formatting your code vertically to improve readability. Based on principles borrowed from mathematics and other disciplines, code alignment gives extra meaning to your code by lining up similar data in columns. Extension for Visual Studio Code for text alignment inspired by Atom Aligment. Uses node-alignment. Supports text alignment and multi-cursor alignment. Mac: ctrl+cmd+a Linux/Windows: ctrl+alt+a. @steve8708 (author) @csholmq.

In Visual Studio 2015 and later, use the C++11 standard alignas specifier to control alignment. For more information, see Alignment.

Microsoft Specific

Use __declspec(align(#)) to precisely control the alignment of user-defined data (for example, static allocations or automatic data in a function).

Syntax

__declspec( align(#) )declarator

Remarks

Writing applications that use the latest processor instructions introduces some new constraints and issues. Many new instructions require data that's aligned to 16-byte boundaries. Additionally, by aligning frequently used data to the processor's cache line size, you improve cache performance. For example, if you define a structure whose size is less than 32 bytes, you may want 32 byte alignment to make sure that objects of that structure type are efficiently cached.

# is the alignment value. Valid entries are integer powers of two from 1 to 8192 (bytes), such as 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, or 64. declarator is the data that you're declaring as aligned.

For information about how to return a value of type size_t that is the alignment requirement of the type, see alignof. For information about how to declare unaligned pointers when targeting 64-bit processors, see __unaligned.

You can use __declspec(align(#)) when you define a struct, union, or class, or when you declare a variable.

The compiler doesn't guarantee or attempt to preserve the alignment attribute of data during a copy or data transform operation. For example, memcpy can copy a struct declared with __declspec(align(#)) to any location. Ordinary allocators (for example, malloc, C++ operator new, and the Win32 allocators) typically return memory that isn't sufficiently aligned for __declspec(align(#)) structures or arrays of structures. To guarantee that the destination of a copy or data transformation operation is correctly aligned, use _aligned_malloc. Or, write your own allocator.

You can't specify alignment for function parameters. When you pass data that has an alignment attribute by value on the stack, its alignment is controlled by the calling convention. If data alignment is important in the called function, copy the parameter into correctly aligned memory before use.

Without __declspec(align(#)), the compiler generally aligns data on natural boundaries based on the target processor and the size of the data, up to 4-byte boundaries on 32-bit processors, and 8-byte boundaries on 64-bit processors. Data in classes or structures is aligned in the class or structure at the minimum of its natural alignment and the current packing setting (from #pragma pack or the /Zp compiler option).

This example demonstrates the use of __declspec(align(#)):

This type now has a 32-byte alignment attribute. It means that all static and automatic instances start on a 32-byte boundary. Additional structure types declared with this type as a member preserve this type's alignment attribute, that is, any structure with Str1 as an element has an alignment attribute of at least 32.

Here, sizeof(struct Str1) is equal to 32. It implies that if an array of Str1 objects is created, and the base of the array is 32-byte aligned, each member of the array is also 32-byte aligned. To create an array whose base is correctly aligned in dynamic memory, use _aligned_malloc. Or, write your own allocator.

The sizeof value for any structure is the offset of the final member, plus that member's size, rounded up to the nearest multiple of the largest member alignment value or the whole structure alignment value, whichever is larger.

The compiler uses these rules for structure alignment:

• Unless overridden with __declspec(align(#)), the alignment of a scalar structure member is the minimum of its size and the current packing.

• Unless overridden with __declspec(align(#)), the alignment of a structure is the maximum of the individual alignments of its member(s).

• A structure member is placed at an offset from the start of its parent structure that's the smallest multiple of its alignment greater than or equal to the offset of the end of the previous member.

• The size of a structure is the smallest multiple of its alignment greater than or equal to the offset of the end of its last member.

__declspec(align(#)) can only increase alignment restrictions.

For more information, see:

• Examples of Structure Alignment (x64 specific)

align Examples

The following examples show how __declspec(align(#)) affects the size and alignment of data structures. The examples assume the following definitions:

In this example, the S1 structure is defined by using __declspec(align(32)). All uses of S1 for a variable definition or in other type declarations are 32-byte aligned. sizeof(struct S1) returns 32, and S1 has 16 padding bytes following the 16 bytes required to hold the four integers. Each int member requires 4-byte alignment, but the alignment of the structure itself is declared to be 32. Then the overall alignment is 32.

In this example, sizeof(struct S2) returns 16, which is exactly the sum of the member sizes, because that is a multiple of the largest alignment requirement (a multiple of 8).

In the following example, sizeof(struct S3) returns 64.

In this example, notice that a has the alignment of its natural type, in this case, 4 bytes. However, S1 must be 32-byte aligned. 28 bytes of padding follow a, so that s1 starts at offset 32. S4 then inherits the alignment requirement of S1, because it's the largest alignment requirement in the structure. sizeof(struct S4) returns 64.

The following three variable declarations also use __declspec(align(#)). In each case, the variable must be 32-byte aligned. In the array, the base address of the array, not each array member, is 32-byte aligned. The sizeof value for each array member is unaffected when you use __declspec(align(#)).

To align each member of an array, code such as this should be used:

In this example, notice that aligning the structure itself and aligning the first element have the same effect:

S6 and S7 have identical alignment, allocation, and size characteristics.

In this example, the alignment of the starting addresses of a, b, c, and d are 4, 1, 4, and 1, respectively.

The alignment when memory is allocated on the heap depends on which allocation function is called. For example, if you use malloc, the result depends on the operand size. If arg >= 8, the memory returned is 8 byte aligned. If arg < 8, the alignment of the memory returned is the first power of 2 less than arg. For example, if you use malloc(7), the alignment is 4 bytes.

Defining new types with __declspec(align(#))

You can define a type with an alignment characteristic.

For example, you can define a struct with an alignment value this way:

Now, aType and bType are the same size (8 bytes) but variables of type bType are 32-byte aligned.

Aligning data in thread local storage

Static thread-local storage (TLS) created with the __declspec(thread) attribute and put in the TLS section in the image works for alignment exactly like normal static data. To create TLS data, the operating system allocates memory the size of the TLS section and respects the TLS section alignment attribute.

This example shows various ways to place aligned data into thread local storage.

How align works with data packing

The /Zp compiler option and the pack pragma have the effect of packing data for structure and union members. This example shows how /Zp and __declspec(align(#)) work together:

The following table lists the offset of each member under different /Zp (or #pragma pack) values, showing how the two interact.

For more information, see /Zp (Struct Member Alignment).

The offset of an object is based on the offset of the previous object and the current packing setting, unless the object has a __declspec(align(#)) attribute, in which case the alignment is based on the offset of the previous object and the __declspec(align(#)) value for the object.

END Microsoft Specific

See also

__declspec
Overview of ARM ABI Conventions
x64 software conventions

While this tutorial has content that we believe is of great benefit to our community, we have not yet tested or edited it to ensure you have an error-free learning experience. It's on our list, and we're working on it! You can help us out by using the 'report an issue' button at the bottom of the tutorial.

Introduction

Formatting code consistently is a pain, especially when working on a team. The beauty of modern day web development is that the tooling has gotten so much better! In this article, we will look at setting up Prettier to automatically format your code in Visual Studio Code.

Sample Code

For demo purposes, here’s the sample code we will be formatting. If you’re picky about code formatting, you’ll pick up on some obvious misteps immediately.

• mix of single vs double quotes
• the first property of the person object should be on it’s own line
• the console statement inside of the function should be indented
• you may or may not like the optional parenthesis surrounding the parameter of the arrow function

Installing the Prettier Extension

To work with Prettier in Visual Studio Code, you’ll need to install the extension. Search for Prettier - Code Formatter. You can see the extension below. If you’re installing it for the first time, you’ll see an “install” button instead of the “uninstall” button you see on mine.

The Format Document Command

With the Prettier extension installed, we can now leverage it to format our code. We’ll work more on this later, but to start, we can use the Format Document command.

To open the command pallette, you can use Command + Shift + P on Mac or Control + Shift + P on Windows. In the command pallette search format, then choose Format Document.

You may then be prompted by to choose which formatter to use. To do so, click the Configure button.

Then choose Prettier - Code Formatter.

And then VOILA! Your code is nice and formatted. Notice all the fancy improvements!

• spacing
• line wrappings
• consistent quotes

Prettier also works with CSS files!

The awesome thing is that this also works on CSS files!

From this…

To this!

Automatically Format on Save

So far, we have had to manually run a command to format our code. Instead, you can choose a setting in VS Code to have your files automatically formatted when you save. This has some great benefits.

You never have to manually format your code again!

• ensure code is formatted without having to think about it
• code doesn’t get checked in that’s not formatted

To change this setting, use Command + , on Mac or Control + , on Windows to open the settings menu. Then search for Editor: Format on Save and make sure it is checked.

With this setting in place, you can go about your business writing sloppily formatted code like we all do knowing that it will all be taken care of automatically for you!

Prettier Configuration in VS Code Settings

Prettier does a lot of things for you by default, but you can also customize the settings. Here are a few of the most common settings.

• Single Quote - choose between single and double quotes
• Semi - choose whether or not to include semi colons at the end of lines
• Tab Width - how many spaces you want a tab to consist of

Open the settings menu as above. Then, search for Prettier. This will bring up all of the settings that you can change right there in your editor.

For example, what if I change the tab width to 10.

Then save my file.

Pretty easy right?! This is probably not the tab width size you want to keep, but it’s all up to you!

Creating a Prettier Configuration File

The downside to using the built-in settings menu in VS Code is that it doesn’t ensure consistency across developers on your team. If you change settings in your VS Code, someone else could have an entirely different set of settings in theirs.

Establish consistent formatting across your team by creating a configuration file!

Vs Code Align Text

To solve this, you can create a Prettier configuration file. It has to be titled .prettierrc.(ext) with one of the following extensions.

• yml, yaml, or json
• js
• toml
• include in package.json file (alternate option)

I typically prefer JSON configuration files where you can define key -> value pairs for your settings. VS Code will even provide some intellisense for you as you type.

Microsoft Studios Visual Code

Here’s an example of a simple configuration file.

For more specifics on the configuration files, check out the Prettier Docs. After creating one of these and checking it in to your project, you can ensure that every team member follows the same formatting rules.

Visual Studio Code Align Code Shortcut

Conclusion

Don’t waste your time manually formatting your code. It takes time that can be better spent writing more code. Take advantage of the amazing modern tools out there and set up Prettier!