Launching workspaces from outside wezterm using fzf

[aniketgm]

Background

Few months back, I had asked this, and I wanted something I could launch from outside. By outside, I meant really outside (outside of wezterm). Although, the solution presented in that post was helpful and I worked with it for a while. However, I was not very happy with it. Now, I have written this small script which can help Launch workspaces outside of wezterm.

If anyone knows how to achieve this from within wezterm using lua (I'm not yet good with lua), please share. NOTE, I'm looking for something where workspaces are not loaded and no keybinding.

This is written in PowerShell since I use Windows for work ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. However, not to worry, it's very very easy to understand (see the comments in the code and Explanation section below). So for folks who don't like Windows, I believe one can easily replicate the same on bash OR other shells, since the wezterm cli commands will remain the same. If anyone comes up with a bash, they can share it here. Hope all this helps.

Workspace Launcher

# Launch Workspace given the workspace configuration.
function LaunchWS ( [String]$WsName, [PSCustomObject]$WsTable )
{
  # First check if workspace already exists
  $WezData = wezterm cli list --format json | ConvertFrom-Json
  $WezWs = $WezData.workspace | Select -Unique
  If ($WsName -in $WezWs) { Write-Output "Workspace already exists. Switch using <alt-w>"; Return }

  # If not exists spawn new workspace with tabs defined in json file
  $PaneID = wezterm cli spawn --cwd $WsTable.workdir --workspace $WsName --new-window
  wezterm cli set-tab-title --pane-id $PaneID "Notes"
  $WsTable.tabs | ForEach-Object {
    $PnID = wezterm cli spawn --pane-id $PaneID --cwd $WsTable.workdir
    wezterm cli set-tab-title --pane-id $PnID $_
  }
}

# Wezterm custom command
function wz ( [String]$RenameWS, [String]$TabName, [Switch]$WSLaunch )
{
  If (-Not [String]::IsNullOrEmpty($RenameWS)) { wezterm cli rename-workspace $RenameWS }
  ElseIf (-Not [String]::IsNullOrEmpty($TabName)) { wezterm cli set-tab-title $TabName }
  ElseIf ($WSLaunch.IsPresent)
  {
    $WsTable = Get-Content -Raw "C:\Users\<USERNAME>\wezterm_workspaces.json" | ConvertFrom-Json
    $WsName = $WsTable.workspaces.PSObject.Properties.Name | fzf --height=20 --cycle --prompt="Launch Workspace  "
    If ([String]::IsNullOrEmpty($WSName)) { Return }
    Else { LaunchWS $WsName $WsTable.workspaces.$WsName }
  }
}

# Extras (features provided by PowerShell):
#  ConvertFrom-Json -- This converts json to PSCustomObject (a PowerShell object similar to a python dictionary with key and value)
#  Get-Content -- is "cat" in bash
#  Variables in PowerShell are defined using a dollar (' $ ') -- e.g. $WsName
#  $_ is a inbuild variable in powershell used when using loops like ForEach-Object. It represents each loop variable when looping.

Workspace Configuration File: wezterm_workspaces.json

{
  "workspaces": {
    "Tool-Sidekick": {
      "workdir": "C:\\Apache24\\htdocs",
      "tabs": ["Program","Logs"]
    },
    "Automation-CVBackup": {
      "workdir": "C:\\Users\\<USERNAME>\\WorkRepos\\Backup\\",
      "tabs": ["Playbook","DockerStat"]
    }
  }
}

Explanation

• The function wz takes three parameters (self explanatory) which become the options of the command wz. The Switch (Switch is a boolean parameter -- powershell feature) WSLaunch, will open a fzf prompt. Then whichever workspace we select, it will launch that workspace using the commands mentioned in the block ElseIf ($WSLaunch.IsPresent)
• The function LaunchWS does the "magic" of launching the workspace. It takes two params, one for workspace name, the other is a PSCustomObject (similar to dictionary in python having key and value), which is an object converted from json using ConvertFrom-Json.

One can customize this further to add new features to this script. Happy Wezzing..