Feature Request: RTL (Right-to-Left) Support in VScode

Hi,

Would it be possible to add Right-to-Left (RTL) support for the Quarto Visual Editor in VS Code?

VS Code doesn’t support RTL text natively. Some community extensions exist, but most either modify core VS Code files or create new file types that their extension can process with proper RTL rendering. Unfortunately, this is not practical for many users.

Many writers rely heavily on RTL readability, and without it, they can’t easily switch away from editors that support it. For reference, here’s one extension that demonstrates how RTL support could look:
RTL Text Documents

If something similar could be integrated into the Quarto extension—or at least into the Visual Editor mode in VS Code—that would be fantastic.

For the rendering/output side, this isn’t an issue: with some basic knowledge of Lua scripting and LaTeX, I’ve already written filters and used LaTeX packages to handle mixed RTL and LTR documents very well. The main challenge is really just the editing experience.

Thanks for considering this!

Start by reviewing the Quarto Visual Editor integration in VS Code and the linked RTL Text Documents extension for possible approaches. The requested outcome is RTL support in the editing experience, including mixed RTL and LTR content; the issue provides no specific files or tests to begin with.