VS Code Processes

The VS Code Processes extensions shows all child processes of VS Code in a custom view in the VS Code Explorer.

From the context menu of a process node you can terminate the process or attach a debugger to it.

Installing VS Code Processes

This extension is still a prototype and so it is not yet available on the Marketplace but you can easily build the vsix with these commands:

  git clone https://github.com/weinand/vscode-processes
  cd vscode-processes
  npm install
  npm run package

Then use VS Code's Install from VSIX... command to install the extension.

Using VS Code Processes

By default the Process View is not shown. To open it use the "Show Process View" command.

The context menu of a process node in the tree supports these actions:

• Kill: tries to kill the process by sending a SIGTERM signal.
• Force Kill: forcefully kills the process by sending a SIGKILL signal.
• Start Node Debugging: this action is only available if the process is identified as a node.js process that supports debugging. The heuristics uses the command line arguments of the process: if a --inspect, --inspect-brk, --debug, or --debug-brk flag is found (with or without port number), a debug session is started against a debug port. If none of the flags are found but the process executable is node a debug session is started via the process ID and the SIGUSR1 mechanism.

More actions are planned in the future.