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Interface Tour

With a file open, the Vaste window has these areas, from top to bottom:

  • The title bar, with the file name.
  • The toolbar, with file actions, the view switcher, and tools for the current view.
  • The viewer, which shows the file. The sidebar rail runs down its left edge, and opens panels such as Bookmarks beside the viewer.
  • The status bar, with your position in the file and details about the file.

Title bar

Section titled “Title bar”

The title bar shows an icon for the file type, the file name, and the name of the folder that contains the file. Hover over the file name to see the full path. A compressed file also shows its format, for example GZ. Every file shows Read-only, because Vaste does not change the files it opens. At the right end, a Commercial trial or Personal use pill shows the license state until you activate a license; click it to open the License settings. See License and pricing. In a narrow window, the title bar hides the folder name, and in a very narrow window, it also hides the format, Read-only, and the pill.

Drag the title bar to move the window. On Windows and Linux, the minimize, maximize, and close buttons are at the right end of the title bar. On macOS, the standard window buttons are at the left.

Toolbar

Section titled “Toolbar”

The toolbar starts with three file buttons: Open file (Ctrl + O), New window (Ctrl + Shift + N), and Close file (Ctrl + W). Close file returns the window to the welcome screen.

Next is the view switcher, which shows the file in Text, Hex, Table, or NDJSON view. Table and NDJSON appear only for files that support them. Selecting the active view switches back to Text view. See How Vaste picks a view.

After the view switcher come the tools for the current view:

View Tools
Text view Wrap (Alt + Z), and a funnel button for Grep view (Ctrl + Shift + G)
Table view, CSV or TSV Filter, Header, Dialect, Analyze, SQL
Table view, NDJSON columns Filter, Schema, SQL
NDJSON view Schema, SQL
Hex view Inspector, Entropy

The right end of the toolbar has Search (Ctrl + F), Go to line (Ctrl + G), Reload (Ctrl + R), and More actions (…). Hover over a button to see its name and shortcut.

In a narrow window, the toolbar shows only Open file, the view switcher, Search, Reload, and More actions. The hidden commands stay available in the More actions menu, the command palette, and their shortcuts.

More menu

Section titled “More menu”

Select More actions (…) at the right end of the toolbar to open the More menu. It lists the same commands in every view, in four groups separated by lines:

  • File group: New window, Close file, Reload, File statistics, and Go to line.
  • View and tools group: Word wrap, Line numbers, Log-level colours, Highlighters, Grep view, Column filters, Header row, CSV dialect…, Analyze table, and SQL query.
  • Panels group: Bookmarks, Find in files, Pinned results, Scratchpad, Schema, Data inspector, Entropy strip, Find strings, Byte histogram, and Checksums.
  • Application group: Command palette and Settings.

A check mark shows that a panel or option is on. Each command shows its shortcut on the right. A command that does not apply to the current file or view is dimmed, and a second line under its name gives the reason, for example that a search must run before Grep view is available.

Use the arrow keys, Home, and End to move through the menu, and Enter to run a command. Press Esc to close the menu.

Status bar

Section titled “Status bar”

The left side of the status bar shows your position in the file. What it shows depends on the view:

View Shows
Text view The current line and the total (Ln 1,200 of 85,000), the percentage through the file, and the number of selected lines
Table view The current row and the total (Row 12 of 4,096), and the number of rows that pass the active filters
Hex view The offset of the byte cursor, and the size of the selection
NDJSON view The number of lines in the file, and the current line

While Vaste reloads a changed file, the left side shows Reloading… instead.

The right side shows details about the file. Some items open a dialog when you select them:

Item Shows Select it to
Auto reload Whether Vaste reloads the file when it changes on disk
File type TXT, CSV, TSV, NDJSON, or BIN
Compressed format The compression format, for compressed files only
CSV dialect The delimiter, the quote character, and whether the file has a header row, for CSV and TSV files only. Shown in yellow when the detection is uncertain. Change the CSV dialect
Encoding The encoding, and (detected) when Vaste guessed it from the content Reopen the file with another encoding
Line ending LF, CRLF, or Mixed. Hover to see how many of each the file has.
Timestamps The active timestamp format, or No timestamps Choose a timestamp format
File size The size of the file Open File statistics

As the window gets narrower, the status bar hides items to make room: first the auto reload item, then the file type, compressed format, CSV dialect, and line ending items, and then the timestamp item. Widen the window to show them again.

Section titled “Sidebar”

The sidebar rail runs down the left edge of the window. Each icon opens a panel in the sidebar:

Panel Shortcut Docs
Bookmarks Ctrl + B Bookmarks
Find in files Ctrl + Shift + D Find in files
Pinned results Ctrl + Shift + P Pinned results
Scratchpad Ctrl + Shift + S Scratchpad
Schema Ctrl + Shift + J NDJSON view, NDJSON files only

The sidebar shows one panel at a time. Select the icon of the open panel, or press its shortcut, to close the sidebar.

To resize the sidebar, drag its right edge. You can also focus the edge with Tab and press Left or Right. Double-click the edge to reset the width. Vaste remembers the width.

Command palette

Section titled “Command palette”

Press Ctrl + K, or select More actions (…) → Command palette, to open the command palette. It lists the commands you can run in the window, with each command’s description and shortcut.

Type to filter the list. The palette matches command names, descriptions, and related keywords, so typing wrap finds Toggle word wrap. Press Enter to run the selected command.

The commands you ran most recently appear first, under Recent. The rest are grouped as File, View, Search & navigation, Tools & panels, and Application. A check mark shows that a toggle command is on. A command that does not apply to the current file or view is dimmed and shows the reason instead of its description.

On the welcome screen, the palette lists only the commands available there: Open file, Open in new window, Settings, and Command palette.

Context menus

Section titled “Context menus”

Right-click a line in Text view or Grep view to open the line menu:

  • Show JSON (Alt + J in Text view): shows the JSON object or array in the line, formatted. See JSON in a line.
  • Copy line: copies the line to the clipboard.
  • Send to scratchpad: adds the selected text to the scratchpad, or the line if nothing is selected.
  • Highlight selection (Alt + H in Text view): creates a highlighter from the selected text. It is available when text or lines are selected. See Log levels and highlighters.
  • Set bookmark here…: sets a bookmark on the line. See Bookmarks.

Table view has its own menus for column headers and rows. See Columns and record view.

Notifications

Section titled “Notifications”

Vaste reports errors, warnings, and other messages in notifications near the bottom of the window. A notification closes after 5 seconds, and at most 3 show at once. Select the close button to dismiss one sooner.

After a reload, a separate notification reports the change. When the file only grew, it shows the number of new lines and offers Jump to new content. See Live reload.

Next steps

Section titled “Next steps”