SideX: A Tauri-Based Port of Visual Studio Code

What SideX Is

SideX is a direct port of Visual Studio Code's workbench that replaces Electron with Tauri — a Rust backend paired with the operating system's native webview (WKWebView on macOS, WebView2 on Windows). The TypeScript frontend remains essentially the same, running without a bundled browser.

Current Status and Performance Claims

This is an early release. Core editing and the integrated terminal are solid, while the extension host and debugger are still in progress.

The primary motivation is reducing memory usage. The project notes that VSCode's memory usage largely comes from its bundled Chromium. By using the system's shared webview, the target is under 200 MB at idle on macOS. RAM savings are most tested on macOS where WKWebView is shared with Safari. On Windows, memory usage with WebView2 is described as more nuanced and is an active area in the Tauri ecosystem.

What's Working Now

• Monaco editor with syntax highlighting and basic IntelliSense
• File explorer with folder operations
• Integrated terminal with full PTY via Rust, shell detection, and resize
• Git operations: status, diff, log, stage, commit, branch, push/pull/fetch, stash, reset
• Multiple built-in themes from the VSCode catalogue
• Native OS menus (macOS, Windows, Linux)
• Extension installation from Open VSX
• File watching, file search, full-text search with Rust-backed search index
• SQLite storage and document management (autosave, undo/redo, encoding)

Architecture and Tech Stack

SideX maps VSCode's Electron architecture onto Tauri:

• VSCode (Electron) → SideX (Tauri): Electron main process → Tauri Rust backend, BrowserWindow → WebviewWindow, ipcMain/ipcRenderer → invoke() + Tauri events, Node.js modules (fs, pty) → Rust commands (std::fs, portable-pty)
• Frontend: TypeScript, Vite 6, Monaco Editor
• Terminal UI: xterm.js + WebGL renderer
• Syntax/Themes: vscode-textmate, vscode-oniguruma (WASM)
• Backend: Rust, Tauri 2
• Terminal: portable-pty (Rust)
• File watching: notify crate (FSEvents on macOS)
• Search: dashmap + rayon + regex (parallel, Rust)
• Storage: SQLite via rusqlite
• Extensions: Open VSX registry

Getting Started

To run in development:

git clone https://github.com/Sidenai/sidex.git
cd sidex
npm install
npm run tauri dev

To build from source:

npm install
# macOS / Linux
NODE_OPTIONS="--max-old-space-size=12288" npm run build
# Windows (PowerShell)
$env:NODE_OPTIONS="--max-old-space-size=12288" npm run build
npx tauri build

The first build takes 5–10 minutes due to Rust compile time. Pre-built binaries are not yet distributed.