tsc ignores my tsconfig.json file

Question

When I run tsc in my project's directory it outputs an error (reproduced later)

This is the first time I'm trying typescript and nodejs. You can safely assume I'm a total beginner.

ubuntu 15.10 64bits
npm version 2.4.12
node version v4.3.1
tsc version 1.7.5
system locale fr_FR.UTF-8

Compiler output :

/data/code/tsrest$ tsc
/usr/lib/node_modules/typescript/lib/tsc.js:31084
            var jsonOptions = json["compilerOptions"];
                                  ^

TypeError: Cannot read property 'compilerOptions' of undefined
    at getCompilerOptions (/usr/lib/node_modules/typescript/lib/tsc.js:31084:35)
    at Object.parseJsonConfigFileContent (/usr/lib/node_modules/typescript/lib/tsc.js:31074:22)
    at parseConfigFile (/usr/lib/node_modules/typescript/lib/tsc.js:31351:40)
    at performCompilation (/usr/lib/node_modules/typescript/lib/tsc.js:31362:45)
    at Object.executeCommandLine (/usr/lib/node_modules/typescript/lib/tsc.js:31336:9)
    at Object.<anonymous> (/usr/lib/node_modules/typescript/lib/tsc.js:31635:4)
    at Module._compile (module.js:409:26)
    at Object.Module._extensions..js (module.js:416:10)
    at Module.load (module.js:343:32)
    at Function.Module._load (module.js:300:12)

Project layout:

-rw-rw-r-- 1  220 févr. 20 17:15 package.json
-rw-rw-r-- 1  375 févr. 20 17:39 tsconfig.json
-rw-rw-r-- 1   70 févr. 20 17:23 typings.json

build:
total 8
drwxrwxr-x 2 4096 févr. 20 17:16 ./
drwxrwxr-x 6 4096 févr. 20 17:37 ../

client:
total 8
drwxrwxr-x 2 4096 févr. 20 17:16 ./
drwxrwxr-x 6 4096 févr. 20 17:37 ../

server:
total 12
drwxrwxr-x 2 4096 févr. 20 17:18 ./
drwxrwxr-x 6 4096 févr. 20 17:37 ../
-rw-rw-r-- 1  298 févr. 20 16:59 tsrest.ts

typings:
total 8
drwxrwxr-x 2 4096 févr. 20 17:23 ./
drwxrwxr-x 6 4096 févr. 20 17:37 ../
-rw-rw-r-- 1    0 févr. 20 17:23 browser.d.ts
-rw-rw-r-- 1    0 févr. 20 17:23 main.d.ts

Some of the things I've tried:

cd tsrest
npm init -y
mkdir server build client

(editing tsconfig.json and server/tsrest.ts from a tutorial)

tsc

Outputs the error

sudo npm install -g typings
typings install
tsc

Well that didn't help either.

cd server/
tsc
cd ..

Now I thought my tsconfig.json was not good.

rm tsconfig.json 
tsc --init
ll
tsc

Same error ...

Contents of tsconfig.json:

{
    "version": "1.7.5",
    "compilerOptions": {
        "module": "commonjs",
        "target": "es5",
        "noImplicitAny": false,
        "outDir": "built",
        "rootDir": ".",
        "emitDecoratorMetadata": true,
        "experimentalDecorators": true
        // "sourceMap": false
    },
    "exclude": [
        "node_modules",
        "client" // 4
    ]
}

Contents of package.json:

{
  "name": "tsrest",
  "version": "1.0.0",
  "description": "",
  "main": "index.js",
  "scripts": {
    "test": "echo \"Error: no test specified\" && exit 1"
  },
  "keywords": [],
  "author": "",
  "license": "ISC"
}

edited the question with tsconfig.json and package.json contents — David V.
is the path /data/code/tsrest from where you are running tsc command, the root folder of your project? Also just to confirm, tsconfig.json is in the root folder of your project right? I just did a typescript test on ubuntu 15 64 bits and things ran just fine... my config [node - 5.6.0, npm 3.6.0, tsc @next] — Seshu Kumar Alluvada
Yes /data/code/tsrest is the root folder of my project and tsconfig.json is in the root folder of my project. — David V.

David V. David V. · Accepted Answer · 2016-02-21T08:16:42

I ran tsc with strace to see if it access tsconfig: (start omitted)

1531  getcwd("/data/code/tsrest", 4096) = 18
1531  stat("tsconfig.json", {st_mode=S_IFREG|0664, st_size=375, ...}) = 0
1531  stat("tsconfig.json", {st_mode=S_IFREG|0664, st_size=375, ...}) = 0
1531  open("tsconfig.json", O_RDONLY|O_CLOEXEC) = 9
1531  fstat(9</data/code/tsrest/tsconfig.json>, {st_mode=S_IFREG|0664, st_size=375, ...}) = 0
1531  read(9</data/code/tsrest/tsconfig.json>, "{\n    \"version\": \"1.7.5\",\n    \"c"..., 375) = 375
1531  close(9</data/code/tsrest/tsconfig.json>) = 0
1531  mmap(0x320402100000, 1048576, PROT_READ|PROT_WRITE, MAP_PRIVATE|MAP_FIXED|MAP_ANONYMOUS, -1, 0) = 0x320402100000
1531  mmap(0x320403100000, 1048576, PROT_READ|PROT_WRITE, MAP_PRIVATE|MAP_FIXED|MAP_ANONYMOUS, -1, 0) = 0x320403100000
1531  munmap(0x7f35b90bd000, 1568768)   = 0
1531  write(2</dev/pts/1>, "/usr/lib/node_modules/typescript"..., 892) = 892
1531  exit_group(1)                     = ?

Note that tsconfig.json is 375 bytes, so the read call reads all of it. So I figured that tsc doesn't parse the JSON file. I edited the file to see if there was anything funny. Only thing that standed out was the comments so I removed them and tried tsc again.

This time it worked.

I'll submit a ticket so that in case tsc can't parse the config file a better error is given.

tsc ignores my tsconfig.json file

2 Answers