[visual-studio-code] Choose folders to be ignored during search in VS Code

Right now when I use ?+O to search for files, the fuzzy matching appears to operate over all files in the current project. Unfortunately, this includes a number of files from build and vendor directories. So, for instance, if I want to search for all JavaScript files and do ?+O and type .js in, the file and symbol results include around 1500 hits and all of them except the two ones are complete noise.

Is there a way to specify certain directories to be ignored for purpose of search?

Create a file with .gitignore & put the folder or file name which one you want to ignore.

to ignore everything below node_modules folder

echo node_modules/ > .gitignore 

This answer is outdated

If these are folders you want to ignore in a certain workspace, you can go to:

AppMenu > Preferences > Workspace Settings

Otherwise, if you want these folders to be ignored in all your workspaces, go to:

AppMenu > Preferences > User Settings

and add the following to your configuration:

//-------- Search configuration --------

// The folders to exclude when doing a full text search in the workspace.
"search.excludeFolders": [
    ".git",
    "node_modules",
    "bower_components",
    "path/to/other/folder/to/exclude"
],

The difference between workspace and user settings is explained in the customization docs

I wanted to exclude 1 of the Workspace folders completely, but found this to be difficult, since regardless of the exclusion patterns, it always runs the search on each of the Workspace folders.

In the end, the solution was to add ** to the Folder Settings search exclusion patterns.

Exclude all from subfolders works like this (version 2019)

include

./db

exclude

./db/*

Extending the most voted answer, now there is an extension to achieve what is described there to toggle quickly in a GUI way. It's called Explorer Exclude. You can install this with this command:

ext install RedVanWorkshop.explorer-exclude-vscode-extension

Demo:

Update April 2018

You can do this in the search section of vscode by pre-fixing an exclamation mark to each folder or file you want to exclude.

After you setup the search.exclude and file.exclude mentioned on the previous answers, run the command "Clear Editor History" (Use the Command Palette to do that - CTRL + SHIFT + P).

Only after that the excluded files will not appear on your quick open menu.

Update: You can run the command "Clear Command History" too. I forgot about that.

I wanted to search for the term "Stripe" in all files except those within a plugin ("plugin" folder) or within the files ending in ".bak", ".bak2" or ".log" (this is within the wp-contents folder structure of a wordpress install).

I just wanted to do this search one time and very quickly, so I didn't want to alter the search settings of my environment. Here's how I did it (note the double asteriks for the folder):

• Search Term: Stripe
• Include Files: {blank}
• Exclude Files: *.bak*, *.log, **/plugins/**

Here's what it looked like

If I understand correctly you want to exclude files from the vscode fuzzy finder. If that is the case, I am guessing the above answers are for older versions of vscode. What worked for me is adding:

"files.exclude": {
    "**/directory-you-want-to-exclude": true,
    "**/.git": true,
    "**/.svn": true,
    "**/.hg": true,
    "**/CVS": true,
    "**/.DS_Store": true
}

to my settings.json. This file can be opened through File>Preferences>Settings

If you have multiple folders in your workspace, set up the search.exclude on each folder. There's a drop-down next to WORKSPACE SETTINGS.

Folder Settings Tab

Hi you need to find settings and add a new exclude pattern for history files

I'm an idiot so it took me a while to realize this, but make sure that the Gear icon is clicked on the global search so your settings can be applied.

The short answer is to comma-separate the folders you want to ignore in "files to exclude".

1. Start workspace wide search: CTRL+SHIFT+f
2. Expand the global search with the three-dot button
3. Enter your search term
4. As an example, in the files to exclude-input field write babel,concat to exclude the folder "babel" and the folder "concat" in the search (make sure the exclude button is enabled).
5. Press enter to get the results.

Forget aboves for vscode exclude search pattern, try to below pattern it is working for any folder in vscode last version!

!../../../locales/*

for example i have searched like below vscode example clude settings

files to include: *.js

files to exclude: **/node_modules,!../../../locales/,!../../../theme/,!../../admin/client/*

Make sure the 'Use Exclude Settings and Ignore Files' cog is selected