Write initial settings to settings.json

Question

I am looking for a way to write initial settings to settings.json for when my extension is installed.

I found WorkspaceConfiguration API, but that seems to retrieving/updating values at runtime.

I'm looking to get my settings + comments into the default settings file

e.g. How TSLint does it:

Answer 1

I hope I get your question correctly: I assume you mean the User Settings settings.json you can get via File>Preferences>User Settings.

If you know that TSLint does it, you can go to your extensions folder (windows: $USERFOLDER/.vscode/extensions), pick the extension (in my case it was the folder "eg2.tslint-0.6.7") and peek the files.

...
"contributes": {
    "configuration": {
        "type": "object",
        "title": "TSLint",
        "properties": {
            "tslint.enable": {
                "type": "boolean",
                "default": true,
                "description": "Control whether tslint is enabled for TypeScript files or not."
            },
            "tslint.rulesDirectory": {
                "type": [
                    "string",
                    "array"
                ],
                "items": {
                    "type": "string"
                },
                "description": "An additional rules directory",
                "default": ""
            },
            "tslint.validateWithDefaultConfig": {
                "type": "boolean",
                "description": "Validate a file when there is only a default tslint configuration is found",
                "default": false
            },
            "tslint.configFile": {
                "type": "string",
                "description": "The path to the rules configuration file",
                "default": ""
            },
            "tslint.ignoreDefinitionFiles": {
                "type": "boolean",
                "default": true,
                "description": "Control if TypeScript definition files should be ignored"
            },
            "tslint.exclude": {
                "type": [
                    "string",
                    "array"
                ],
                "items": {
                    "type": "string"
                },
                "description": "Configure glob patterns of file paths to exclude from linting"
            },
            "tslint.run": {
                "type": "string",
                "enum": [
                    "onSave",
                    "onType"
                ],
                "default": "onType",
                "description": "Run the linter on save (onSave) or on type (onType)"
            },
            "tslint.nodePath": {
                "type": "string",
                "default": "",
                "description": "A path added to NODE_PATH when resolving the tslint module."
            },
            "tslint.autoFixOnSave": {
                "type": "boolean",
                "default": false,
                "description": "Turns auto fix on save on or off."
            }
        }
    }
...

Hope this helps