Settings

Sheaf has nine settings, and this page has an entry for each, headed by the name you see in the Settings UI. Reach them in the Settings UI under Extensions, Sheaf, or edit settings.json directly. Every one applies to editors that are already open, so you can watch a change take effect.

Keys on this page use Cmd. On Windows and Linux, use Ctrl in its place.

The default editor

sheaf.useAsDefaultMarkdownEditor, default true.

On: Sheaf is the default editor for .md and .markdown files, so Markdown opens rendered right after you install it. The plain text editor stays one click away, at the right end of the formatting toolbar.

Off: Markdown opens in the plain text editor, and you open individual files in Sheaf yourself. Use this to opt in per file:

"sheaf.useAsDefaultMarkdownEditor": false

Then open a file in Sheaf with Open in Sheaf, which is also on the explorer right-click menu, or with View: Reopen Editor With… → Sheaf (WYSIWYG).

The change applies to files you open afterwards. Editors that are already open keep the editor they were opened with.

Content width

sheaf.contentWidth, default "708px".

Sets the width of the centered text column. Any CSS length works:

• "90ch" sets the column by character count.
• "100%" fills the editor pane.

Auto-save

sheaf.autoSave, default true.

On: Sheaf saves the file a short moment after you stop typing, the way a notes app does.

Off: your edits still update the document, and you save with Cmd+S or leave it to VS Code’s own files.autoSave.

Closing a tab within a moment of typing asks whether to save. The short moment is about three quarters of a second, and closing the tab inside it means VS Code asks about the file before Sheaf has written it. Answer Save, or Cancel and close again: your typing is in the document either way, and only Don’t Save throws it away. Pause for a moment before closing and the question never comes.

This is the one place Sheaf’s own saving cannot reach. VS Code decides to ask at the instant you press the close button, and an extension hears about that press at the same instant rather than before it, so the file is written a few milliseconds after the question is already on screen. Setting VS Code’s own files.autoSave avoids it completely, because then the saving happens inside the editor rather than through an extension.

Line numbers

sheaf.lineNumbers, default false.

On: numbers run down the left of the document, and every table’s selector column, the strip down the left of its grid, carries each row’s number.

Off: neither is drawn. A table’s selector column stays as a narrow blank strip, because it is what you click to select a row and drag to move rows, and the corner beside it selects the whole table.

The button at the right of the formatting toolbar turns them on and off, and the choice is remembered for every document you open, the way VS Code remembers its own.

A table’s row numbers follow this one setting rather than having one of their own, because wanting numbers down a document and wanting them beside a table’s rows are the same preference. They are not the same numbers: a table counts its rows from the first one under its header, so row 4 is the fourth row of data wherever the table sits in the file. That is what a copied reference names whether or not the grid is drawing the digits. See Tables and Sharing a reference.

Reveal syntax on the current line

sheaf.revealSyntaxOnLine, default false.

On: the block the cursor is on shows its raw Markdown markers, so the block you are writing in shows its syntax while the rest of the document stays rendered.

Off: a block shows its raw Markdown only while Edit Markdown (Cmd+Alt+E) has it open.

A quote’s > is the one marker this leaves hidden. Everything else on a quoted line shows as written, asterisks and backticks and link brackets included. The > stays away because a quote’s indent already leaves room for it, so drawing it would shift the words sideways as you moved the cursor onto the line and back as you left. Edit Markdown shows it, as it shows everything.

Double-click to edit source

sheaf.doubleClickToEditSource, default false.

On: double-clicking a rendered element reveals its raw Markdown for editing.

Off: double-clicking selects a word, as it does everywhere else. Edit Markdown reveals the Markdown either way.

Front matter

sheaf.frontMatter, default "collapsed".

Sets how much of a document’s YAML front matter Sheaf draws. The lines stay in the file and are saved in every state.

• "collapsed": one strip naming the front matter and the document’s title, with a chevron that opens it.
• "shown": every line of the front matter, as written.
• "hidden": nothing, taking no height, so the text begins where it would in a file with no front matter.

Putting the caret in the block opens it whatever this says. Show Front Matter, Collapse Front Matter and Hide Front Matter set it from the Command Palette. See Front matter.

Table of contents

sheaf.tableOfContents, default "hidden".

Sets whether a panel of the document’s headings shows beside the text, marking the one you are reading. It applies to every Markdown file you open in Sheaf.

• "shown": the panel lists the headings.
• "collapsed": the panel shows its Contents header with the list folded away.
• "hidden": no panel, and the margin is left to the text.

true and false still work, and mean "shown" and "hidden". The toolbar’s list button turns the panel on and off. See Table of contents.

Comments

sheaf.comments, default show.

Sets how Sheaf draws the notes written into a document as <!-- ... -->.

• show: each comment that sits on its own lines is drawn as a box labelled Comment, with a chevron that collapses it.
• hidden: each comment shrinks to a small marker you can click to read it.

Toggle Comments flips between them. See Comments.

Commands

All of them are in the Command Palette under Sheaf.

Command	What it does
Open in Sheaf	Open the current file in the WYSIWYG editor
Open as Raw Markdown (Text)	Drop back to the plain text editor
Toggle Whole-Document Source Mode	Reveal raw Markdown for the whole document
Toggle Table of Contents	Show or hide the panel of headings
Show Table of Contents	Show the panel of headings
Collapse Table of Contents	Show the panel’s header with the list folded away
Hide Table of Contents	Hide the panel of headings
Toggle Comments	Draw the document’s comments as boxes, or shrink each to a marker
Show Front Matter	Draw every line of the front matter
Collapse Front Matter	Draw the front matter as one strip
Hide Front Matter	Draw no front matter
Copy Ref (Cmd+Shift+C)	Put the file, the lines and the text you picked on the clipboard
Send Selection to Terminal (Cmd+Shift+Alt+T)	Type a reference to the lines you picked at your terminal’s prompt
Open This Folder in a Browser	Serve this folder on this machine and give you the address
Stop Serving to the Browser	Stop it again
About	Say which build of Sheaf this window is running, with a button to copy it

Copy Ref and Send Selection to Terminal are covered in Sharing a reference, and the two browser commands in In a browser.

Which build you are running

Run Sheaf: About. It shows the version, the commit it was built from, and the editor it is running in, with a Copy button that puts that one line on the clipboard. Paste it into a bug report and whoever reads it knows exactly what you were using.

A build made from a modified copy of the source says so, because its commit alone does not describe what is running.

If a newer build of Sheaf is installed while your window is open, the window keeps running the one it started with until it reloads. Sheaf notices and offers you a Reload Window button, once, so a change you were told about is not invisible while you look straight at it. Nothing reloads without you asking.

In a browser tab there is no Extensions pane to consult, so the same line sits in the footer of the folder page.