Languages & LSP

Syntax highlighting

e uses tree-sitter for fast, accurate syntax highlighting. Supported languages include:

Rust · Python · JavaScript · TypeScript · Go · C / C++ · JSON · TOML · PHP · HTML · CSS · Blade · Vue · Svelte · Markdown · Shell

The language is detected from the file extension (and a few special names, like Cargo.lock and *.blade.php).

Language Server Protocol

When a language server is available on your PATH, e launches it automatically and provides:

• Diagnostics — errors and warnings shown inline (squiggles) and in the problems panel.
• Completion — context-aware suggestions (⌘Space to trigger manually).
• Hover — type and documentation popups (F1).
• Go to definition (F12) and find references (⇧F12).
• Document & workspace symbols (⌘⇧O).
• Formatting — on save, or via the "Format Document" command.
• Rename and code actions (where the server supports them).
• Signature help — parameter hints while typing a call.
• Inlay hints — inline type and parameter-name hints from the language server.

Supported servers

See Installation for install commands — or just open a file: when a server's binary isn't on PATH, e names it and prints the command that installs it instead of reporting a spawn failure.

Servers are launched per language, so a mixed project (e.g. PHP + TypeScript) gets full support for each. A language can also run several servers at once — see below.

The Laravel language server

In a Laravel project, e runs the official laravel/lsp alongside Intelephense, and merges their answers: Intelephense for general PHP intelligence, laravel/lsp for framework awareness. It also gives Blade files a language server, which they otherwise wouldn't have.

Install it once:

composer global require laravel/lsp

Make sure Composer's global vendor/bin is on your PATH. If it isn't installed, nothing breaks — you simply keep e's built-in Laravel intelligence, and e tells you the command that would install it (once per session, not once per file). Install it while e is running and the next PHP or Blade file you open picks it up; no restart needed.

Or let e do it: Laravel: Install Intelephense and Laravel: Install Laravel language server in the command palette (⌘⇧P) run the install command in a terminal tab and start the server the moment it appears. In a Laravel project the status bar shows a missing PHP server whatever file is open, and clicking it does the same.

It adds routes, views/Blade, translations, config, environment variables, assets/Mix, middleware, Inertia, Livewire, auth/policies, container bindings and validation rules — with completions, hovers, diagnostics (an unknown route or missing view is now a squiggle) and quick fixes.

When the server is running it owns the route() / view() / config() / env() contexts. Turn it off in Settings → Laravel → “Laravel language server” to fall back to e's built-in helpers instead (restart to apply).

How several servers share one file

Server settings

e hands each server the settings it asks for over workspace/configuration (and pushes them once after the handshake). Intelephense gets files.maxSize = 5 MB instead of its 1 MB default, so a Laravel project's Composer class map and — more usefully — the model helper Laravel Idea writes to vendor/_laravel_ide/ are indexed rather than skipped with an "over the maximum file size" line.

Server health

The status bar shows each server for the active file: intelephense ✓, what it is busy with while it indexes (intelephense: Indexing 42%), or why it isn't there (laravel-lsp ↓ click to install, intelephense ✗ crashed). Click it to bring back whatever is down: a server that isn't installed has its install command run in a terminal tab and starts the moment the binary appears on PATH; a crashed one is started again.

A server that dies is restarted and handed every open document again, up to three times per session; after that it is left down and you are told. A server that can't start at all (a broken install, say) is left down until you click.

Messages a server sends about itself — an invalid license, a project too large to index — appear as notifications. Edits a server asks for (workspace/applyEdit, including from code actions that run a server command) are applied to open buffers through the editor, and to other files on disk.

Columns are converted between the editor's UTF-8 bytes and the server's UTF-16 units, so squiggles, completions and renames land where they should on lines with æøå, emoji or any other non-ASCII text. Servers that speak UTF-8 (rust-analyzer, clangd) are asked to, and skip the conversion.

Nothing waits for a server

Servers start in the background: opening a file never waits for a handshake, and in a Laravel project the PHP and Blade servers are started as soon as the project opens, so they are usually ready before the first file is. Edits made while a server starts are folded into the document it is handed when it comes up. The status bar shows intelephense … until then.

Every keystroke sends the server only the bytes that changed (for servers that support incremental sync — all the usual ones do), through a writer thread, so a server that is slow to read never stalls typing. When several servers serve one file they are asked in parallel, and a request the user has typed past is cancelled ($/cancelRequest) rather than left to finish. Formatting, including format-on-save, runs off the UI thread; if the file changes while the server is formatting, the stale result is dropped rather than applied. The Laravel query-builder lint (unknown columns against the live schema) runs 300 ms after the last edit, on a background thread.

Diagnostics

Errors and warnings appear as coloured squiggles under the code, with counts in the status bar (⨯ errors ⚠ warnings).

Problems panel

The workspace problems panel collects every diagnostic across the project, grouped by file. Click an entry to jump straight to the issue.

Code actions & refactors

Press ⌘. to request code actions from the language server at the cursor or selection: quick fixes for diagnostics and refactors such as extract variable and extract method. Pick one from the list to apply its edit. What's offered depends on the server (e.g. rust-analyzer is rich here; some servers offer little). Symbol rename is F2; a document outline of the active file sits in the sidebar.

Completion, snippets & signatures

• Even without a language server, built-in completion offers language keywords, identifiers from the open file, and (for PHP/Blade) Laravel facades and Blade directives.
• Framework-aware completion: Flux UI components (<flux:…>), Livewire wire: directives, Tailwind utility classes (inside class="…"), and Vue/Svelte directives.
• Completion combines LSP suggestions with built-in snippets (per-language templates) and, for Laravel projects, helper completions.
• Accepting a snippet places the caret at the first placeholder.
• Define your own snippets in config.json under snippets (per language): "snippets": { "php": [ { "prefix": "dd", "body": "dd($0);" } ] }.
• Signature help shows the active parameter as you type arguments.

Inline AI completion

Optionally, e can show whole-line AI suggestions as grey “ghost text” at the cursor, generated by a local Ollama code model:

• Enable it in Settings → Editor (ai_completion in config.json). It's off by default and fully local — nothing runs unless it's on and Ollama is reachable.
• After a short idle it requests a fill-in-the-middle completion and shows the next line inline; press Tab to accept, or keep typing / Esc to dismiss.
• The model is set via E_COMPLETION_MODEL (default qwen2.5-coder); pull one first, e.g. ollama pull qwen2.5-coder.
• Requests are debounced and run off the UI thread, so they never block editing, and they defer to the LSP completion popup when it's open.

Bracket matching

The bracket matching the one next to the caret is highlighted, making it easy to see scope boundaries.