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David Johnston
David Johnston

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Has VS Code got worse recently?

While screen sharing today, a colleague commented that it seems like VS Code has got less stable in recent weeks - and that does appear to be the case.

Issues are mainly around:

  • Linting (Linter failing to fire and requiring a VSCode restart)
  • Whatever you call it when you can mouse over something for information, or CTRL/CMD + click to follow through it.

Anyone else experiencing this? Or is there some kind of code decay that would cause this?

Top comments (13)

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bence42 profile image
Bence Szabo • Edited

Yes. I've been using it on the same C++ codebase for 2 years and the performance is either great or horrible release by release. I've stopped the auto update for both code and the extensions when things were ok. I guess it's not easy to deliver to all platforms, languages and code sizes, however I have a guess that it's mainly developped for Mac and *script languages of 200 lines.
Oh and there's the rg taking up all CPU for a search issue that's unsolved for 2 years. I'm really sad about this tool..
Edit: I have 2 extensions

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drawcard profile image
Drawcard • Edited

Are you using vanilla VS Code without any extensions running? Sometimes linting can be a problem if you have two different linters running at once on the same file. You can also easily get clashes in Autocomplete / tooltip hints just by having 2 different plugins fighting over control of it.

I try to avoid plugin bundles that seem to put dozens of plugins in, as they will sometimes clash with others that I'm running. I'm really picky about what plugins I install to try and keep VSCode optimized. Luckily you can specify what projects run which plugins, so it's easier to do this. For example, there's no need for Angular helper plugins to run on a Python project.

VSCode is great because it's so customisable, but with great power comes great responsibility and it's so easy to trash your setup with a dodgy config file, so maybe try deactivating it and see what happens. Good luck!

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dwjohnston profile image
David Johnston

I do have a bunch of VSCode plugins running. Imma try strip it back see if that helps.

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salembream profile image
salembream • Edited

Hi,
I had similar issues and more with python.
I have a workspace with several folders,
if one of these folder is missing the .vscode/settings.json file, the VSCode python suppprt will completely - and silently- be broken after one or two actions!
After I've added .vscode/settings.json files with empty Json object - {} - in all folders, VSCode is stable for me now.
As I am new to vscode, I don't know if this is expected, but I don't think so as there is 0 warning or indication!

I hope someone here confirm - or deny - this so we maybe report it to the GitHub repo.

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jkhaui profile image
Jordy Lee

Been telling you to try webstorm for the past year ;)

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functional_js profile image
Functional Javascript

Does webstorm still take 5 minutes to start up, and max out the CPU as it's "reindexing" for the sake of keeping busy? :)

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jkhaui profile image
Jordy Lee

Hahaha actually yes, I often came close to hurling my 8gb ram laptop against the wall as webstorm took half a day to start up.

But on my new 16gb MSI it never hangs when indexing. All the benefits without the downsides ;)

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functional_js profile image
Functional Javascript

That's too bad. I was hoping to check it out again. :)
I left webstorm for VSC in 2016.
I think I miss the 2016 version of VSC, back when it was lightweight and fast.
As per typical of most software project evolutions, it inevitably morphs into bloatware.

The old expression...
Software is never finished, it's abandoned.

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jbalakrishna profile image
Bala Krishna

I have been experiencing the same for past week 👍

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functional_js profile image
Functional Javascript

The VSC team should spend the next six month on nothing but performance fixes, stability fixes, and excessive code removal.

I have one requirement for an IDE, it has to be faster than me.
If I have to wait for it, that's a software failure.

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ioannismichas profile image
Ioannis Michas

i am using the VS Code for Powershell.Since the latest 2 updates the console ( both integrated and normal) keeps freezing and is not responding.I have returned to the old good PowerShell ISE.

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reinoute profile image
Reinout

Same here, since last release

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vilayatalimirza profile image
vilayatalimirza

Yes, I faced linting issues today too.
But that can be fixed by installing pylint in the virtual environment using:
pip install pylint