Cannot find Node process using VSCode Debugger

Question

I'm testing out the VS Code node debugger, but I'm not able to find any node processes when trying to attach to a running process.

This is my launch.json file:

{
    "version": "0.2.0",
    "configurations": [
        {
            "type": "node",
            "request": "attach",
            "name": "Attach by Process ID",
            "processId": "${command:PickProcess}"
        }
    ]
}

the contents of my package.json file:

  "scripts": {
    "start": "node --inspect=0.0.0.0:9229 ./bin/www"
  }

After I start up the process using 'npm start', I press 'start debug' and the list of node processes is:

1 sssd_pam
1 sssd_nss
1 sssd_be

Looks like this and none of these are the server I just launched. This list persists even after I take down the node server.

Why am I not able to see any of my running node processes in the VSCode process attach?

P.s. I'm closely following this tutorial on debugging Node.js with VS Code.

Please, post the scripts in your package.json file so we can help. Maybe there's a problem with the NPM Start script. — Luís Brito
After adding --inspect=0.0.0.0:9229 to the npm script, it is now working. Thank you! — Michael

Luís Brito Luís Brito · Accepted Answer · 2018-11-30T19:42:56

Are you running the NodeJS in debug mode inside npm start? You need to use the --inspect flag. Without this flag, the NodeJS interpreter won't open the debug port to the VSCode to attach to.

Refer to: https://nodejs.org/en/docs/guides/debugging-getting-started/

Another option is to attach using a port definition. I usually do something like this in the launch.json:

{
  "type": "node",
  "request": "attach",
  "name": "Attach",
  "port": 9229,
  "restart": true,
  "sourceMaps": true,
  "protocol": "inspector"
}

Then I start the NodeJS process as: node --inspect=0.0.0.0:9229 start.js

Cannot find Node process using VSCode Debugger

1 Answers