# Configuring supported languages

Zed offers powerful customization options for each programming language it supports. This guide will walk you through the various ways you can tailor your coding experience to your preferences and project requirements.

Zed's language support is built on two main technologies:

1. Tree-sitter: This handles syntax highlighting and structure-based features like the outline panel.
2. Language Server Protocol (LSP): This provides semantic features such as code completion and diagnostics.

These components work together to provide Zed's language capabilities.

In this guide, we'll cover:

- Language-specific settings
- File associations
- Working with language servers
- Formatting and linting configuration
- Customizing syntax highlighting and themes
- Advanced language features

By the end of this guide, you should know how to configure and customize supported languages in Zed.

For a comprehensive list of languages supported by Zed and their specific configurations, see our [Supported Languages](./languages.md) page. To go further, you could explore developing your own extensions to add support for additional languages or enhance existing functionality. For more information on creating language extensions, see our [Language Extensions](./extensions/languages.md) guide.

## Language-specific Settings

Zed allows you to override global settings for individual languages. These custom configurations are defined in your `settings.json` file under the `languages` key.

Here's an example of language-specific settings:

```json
"languages": {
  "Python": {
    "tab_size": 4,
    "formatter": "language_server",
    "format_on_save": "on"
  },
  "JavaScript": {
    "tab_size": 2,
    "formatter": {
      "external": {
        "command": "prettier",
        "arguments": ["--stdin-filepath", "{buffer_path}"]
      }
    }
  }
}
```

You can customize a wide range of settings for each language, including:

- [`tab_size`](./configuring-zed.md#tab-size): The number of spaces for each indentation level
- [`formatter`](./configuring-zed.md#formatter): The tool used for code formatting
- [`format_on_save`](./configuring-zed.md#format-on-save): Whether to automatically format code when saving
- [`enable_language_server`](./configuring-zed.md#enable-language-server): Toggle language server support
- [`hard_tabs`](./configuring-zed.md#hard-tabs): Use tabs instead of spaces for indentation
- [`preferred_line_length`](./configuring-zed.md#preferred-line-length): The recommended maximum line length
- [`soft_wrap`](./configuring-zed.md#soft-wrap): How to wrap long lines of code
- [`show_completions_on_input`](./configuring-zed.md#show-completions-on-input): Whether or not to show completions as you type
- [`show_completion_documentation`](./configuring-zed.md#show-completion-documentation): Whether to display inline and alongside documentation for items in the completions menu

These settings allow you to maintain specific coding styles across different languages and projects.

## File Associations

Zed automatically detects file types based on their extensions, but you can customize these associations to fit your workflow.

To set up custom file associations, use the [`file_types`](./configuring-zed.md#file-types) setting in your `settings.json`:

```json
"file_types": {
  "C++": ["c"],
  "TOML": ["MyLockFile"],
  "Dockerfile": ["Dockerfile*"]
}
```

This configuration tells Zed to:

- Treat `.c` files as C++ instead of C
- Recognize files named "MyLockFile" as TOML
- Apply Dockerfile syntax to any file starting with "Dockerfile"

You can use glob patterns for more flexible matching, allowing you to handle complex naming conventions in your projects.

## Working with Language Servers

Language servers are a crucial part of Zed's intelligent coding features, providing capabilities like auto-completion, go-to-definition, and real-time error checking.

### What are Language Servers?

Language servers implement the Language Server Protocol (LSP), which standardizes communication between the editor and language-specific tools. This allows Zed to support advanced features for multiple programming languages without implementing each feature separately.