How should the interaction between Theia and VS Code be implemented so that both can access more than just basic data types?

[rainwell]

For example, VS Code should be able to access a service from Theia.
Using commands can only exchange basic data types because of serialization. Similarly, using the file system also involves serialization, making it impossible to exchange complex data structures. For example, if I want VS Code to access Theia's dialog class to display Theia's dialog instead of VS Code's default-style dialog, the styles would be inconsistent. How should this be implemented to achieve a unified style?

[msujew]

Hey @rainwell,

For example, if I want VS Code to access Theia's dialog class to display Theia's dialog instead of VS Code's default-style dialog, the styles would be inconsistent. How should this be implemented to achieve a unified style?

Since the vscode extensions and the Theia frontend live in completely separate processes, there is no way to have direct programmatic access to objects/classes from the frontend in your vscode extension.

The best solution would be to implement a new service in the frontend for displaying those dialogs and registering a command that can be accessed by the vscode extension to communicate with that service.