Allow selective overriding of file explorer and workbench icon associations, instead of overriding all icons

[hamirmahal]

Problem Statement

I'd like to, for example, create a new programming language.

I'd like to change the icon file association for my programming language, so that a logo for my programming language appears instead of the default icon.

For simplicity, let's say I'm creating a fictitious GitHub programming language that has files that end in .gh and my language makes use of a github script, for which I am also updating the icon.

If I just do

        "iconThemes": [
            {
              "id": "override",
              "label": "Only override a few icons",
              "path": "./override-icon-theme.json"
            }
        ],

in the contributes section of package.json, and override-icon-theme.json is

{
	"iconDefinitions": {
		"_github_logo": {
			"iconPath": "./GitHub-Mark-120px-plus.png"
		}
	},
	"fileExtensions": {
		"gh": "_github_logo"
	},
	"fileNames": {
		"github": "_github_logo"
	}
}

then I end up with

Notice how all icons are gone, except for the ones I specified.

How do I keep all icons, except for the specific ones I want to override?

Even if I were to just copy-and-paste extensions/theme-seti/icons/vs-seti-icon-theme.json, and merge

{
	"iconDefinitions": {
		"_github_logo": {
			"iconPath": "./GitHub-Mark-120px-plus.png"
		}
	},
	"fileExtensions": {
		"gh": "_github_logo"
	},
	"fileNames": {
		"github": "_github_logo"
	}
}

with that, that would be a hindrance to developers who use, say, extensions/theme-defaults/fileicons/vs_minimal-icon-theme.json, since now they have to use extensions/theme-seti/icons/vs-seti-icon-theme.json as their "fallback" icons to see updated icons for the fictitious "GitHub" programming language.

It would be really helpful if I could just selectively pick-and-choose which icon file associations to override, and let the remaining icon associations stay as-is, so as to not disturb developers' other icon preferences.

What are your thoughts on this?

[aeschli]

There's PR #118846 in the works that allows languages extensions to define a default icon for their language.

Ok to close in favor of #118846?

[hamirmahal]

Ah, I was not aware of this. That's fine with me. Thank you for the response!

Another issue I created, #138949, is also basically a duplicate of #118846.