this post was submitted on 07 Apr 2025
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Programming
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I can't imagine a sandbox would help. what can an an extension do that doesn't touch some arbitrary code that gets run? it could add a line to the middle of a giant file right before you run and remove it immediately after. even if you run the whole editor in a sandbox you do eventually deploy that code somewhere, it can change something inconspicuous like a url in a dependency file that might not get caught in a pr
the only solution is to audit everything you install, know all the code you run, etc. ofc that's not reasonable, but idk what else there is. better automated virus check things maybe? identity verification for extension publishers? idk if there's an actual solution
It seems so far Zed is cautious, providing api only for specific extensions - i.e. language servers and gui themes.
I run stuff from the command line using a trusted build tool (Mill, in scala), or via a local server (where js is sandboxed).
But indeed, a tricky language server or AI tool (I don't use yet) might inject code where I don't inspect before running it. That's a risk even with java-based IDEs - java has security permissions, not in js (vscode) or rust (zed), but are they applied...? As for audits, a problem with vscode is the marketplace got too big, so many extensions, many lookalikes, nobody can check them all...
well the language server plugins all run a binary language server out of sandbox so zed doesn't really do anything safer in particular there either. no ide has solutions, solutions don't really exist right now. it's not a problem of features of the language as much as it is features developers expect in extensions. I suppose there is a hypothetical "the extension wants to make this change to this file, approve" type flow like AI tools have now, but that sounds unpleasant to use. it still doesn't get around things like language servers being designed to run as standalone processes out of sandbox.
by audits I meant you individually go and read all the code of all the extensions you use. of course that's impossible too, but that was my point
Might be one thing AI tools will be super useful for, if it's possible to teach it what types of code are potentially malicious and able to automatically flag it for review AT LEAST.