The Java Debugger extension received much feedback to support customizing the Variable Formatter. For example:

• Show decimal/hex/oct for int.
• Show logical structure for Array/List/Map/Collections.
• Show toString() for Object.

But current VS Code doesn't provide the frontend UI or the protocol for changing the Variable Format dynamically. See the docs here, https://code.visualstudio.com/api/references/contribution-points#contributes.menus, it doesn't say the extension could contribute context menus to the debug Variable view.

The request is to expose the contribution.menus for Variable view, and carry the hovered variable type info in the menu context. Besides, the DAP should provide some approach to re-request the variable info after dynamically changing the variable format.