Project Browser
The Project Browser is Flint's primary view: a tree of your Ignition gateways, projects, and resources rendered directly from the project files on disk. It gives you Designer-style project navigation inside VS Code — including inherited resources and script symbols — without opening the Designer at all.
Works offline. The Project Browser only needs a valid Flint configuration file with at least one gateway and project path — see Configuration. No gateway connection, API token, or Designer Bridge module is required.
Opening the browser
Click the Flint for Ignition icon in the Activity Bar. The Project Browser renders nothing until you have selected both a gateway and a project — use the Gateway and Project items in the status bar, or the Flint: Select Gateway and Flint: Select Project commands. If no configuration exists yet, the view shows a welcome panel that launches the Get Started wizard (see Quick Start).
Tree structure
The tree follows the hierarchy gateway → project → resource types → folders → resources:
| Level | What it shows |
|---|---|
| Resource type groups | One node per resource type (Project Scripts, Named Queries, Views, and so on), with a resource count. Perspective types are grouped under a Perspective category. |
| Folders | The folder hierarchy from the project's resource paths. |
| Resources | Individual resources; clicking opens the primary file (for example code.py for a script, view.json for a view). |
| Singleton config types | Session Props, Session Events, and Page Config appear as single nodes and are created on first click if they do not exist yet. |
See Resources for the full list of supported resource types and the operations (create, rename, duplicate, delete) available from the tree's context menus.
Script symbol expansion
Python script resources expand one level further: functions, classes, and module-level constants appear as child nodes, and classes expand to their methods. Clicking a symbol jumps to its line in the editor, and each symbol offers Copy Symbol Path (flint.copySymbolPath) to copy its fully qualified path (for example myProject.utils.calculate) for use in other scripts or bindings.
Inherited resources
When a project inherits from a parent project, inherited resources appear dimmed in the tree with an (inherited from <parent>) annotation, so you can see the project's effective contents the same way the Designer presents them. Toggle this with flint.showInheritedResources.
Health decorations
The Project Browser decorates nodes to surface structural problems without you opening each resource:
| Decoration | Meaning |
|---|---|
Missing resource.json | A resource directory has no resource.json manifest. The warning propagates up through parent folders so problems are visible from the top of the tree. |
Invalid resource.json | The manifest exists but fails validation. |
| Missing parent project | The project's declared parent cannot be found under your configured project paths. |
| Circular inheritance | The project inheritance chain loops back on itself. |
| Deprecated resource type | The resource uses a type Flint marks as deprecated. |
For missing manifests, run Flint: Validate Project to list every issue, or use the tree context-menu actions to create a single resource.json or all missing ones at once. See Resources for details.
View actions
The view title bar provides three actions:
| Action | Command | Behavior |
|---|---|---|
| Refresh | flint.refreshProjects | Re-scans project paths and rebuilds the tree. |
| Search | flint.searchResources | Opens resource search (Cmd/Ctrl+Shift+R) — see Search. |
| Open Config | flint.openConfig | Opens your flint.config.json. |
The Project Browser has no filter, sort, or collapse-all controls. To find a specific resource, use Search instead; to pick up file changes made outside VS Code, use Refresh (automatic refresh on file changes is on by default via flint.autoRefreshProjects).
Settings
| Setting | Default | Effect |
|---|---|---|
flint.showInheritedResources | true | Show inherited resources in the project browser. |
flint.groupResourcesByType | true | Group resources by type in the project browser. |
flint.autoRefreshProjects | true | Automatically refresh projects when files change. |
flint.showEmptyResourceTypes | false | Show resource types even when they have no resources. |
See Settings for the complete settings reference.