Indicate in the editor that a type is explicitly `any`

🔍 Search Terms

any marker editor

✅ Viability Checklist

• This wouldn't be a breaking change in existing TypeScript/JavaScript code
• This wouldn't change the runtime behavior of existing JavaScript code
• This could be implemented without emitting different JS based on the types of the expressions
• This isn't a runtime feature (e.g. library functionality, non-ECMAScript syntax with JavaScript output, new syntax sugar for JS, etc.)
• This isn't a request to add a new utility type: https://github.com/microsoft/TypeScript/wiki/No-New-Utility-Types
• This feature would agree with the rest of our Design Goals: https://github.com/Microsoft/TypeScript/wiki/TypeScript-Design-Goals

⭐ Suggestion

Types that are explicitly set to any are sometimes hard to distinguish from actually typed variables in the editor. You might be adopting types while still having a lot of any around and then it would be helpful to call any out more explicitly in the editor.

📃 Motivating Example

I am now using the extension https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=danvk.any-xray which does this:

💻 Use Cases

1. What do you want to use this for?

Seeing explicit any types easily so that I can work on adding types.

3. What shortcomings exist with current approaches?

I can disable explicit any by producing errors but that is very aggressive.

5. What workarounds are you using in the meantime?

Hovering over the type.

The issue describes an editor indication for explicitly declared any types and points to the any-xray extension as a reference. Start by tracing how TypeScript exposes type information to editors and reviewing related editor or language-service tests; done means the intended indication is implemented without changing runtime output and is covered by tests.