While editing a React project in Visual Studio Code (1.28.2, Mac OS 10.14, all extensions disabled), the entire system often slows to a crawl. It's not clear what triggers this, but it's seems to be just normal text editing.
Usually when I look in VSCode's Process Explorer, the electron_node tsserver.js process is using the most CPU.
Is it possible to disable whatever it is that makes this process run? I don't mind losing features; I just want to be able to edit files.
Disable the "TypeScript and JavaScript Language Features" built-in extension to Visual Studio Code (for your current workspace or globally, as you desire). You can find this extension by going to the extension manager, selecting "Show Built-in Extensions" from the "..." menu, and looking in the "Features" section.
I have the problem when updating npm packages while VSCode is open.
For me this works: By turning on the setting typescript.disableAutomaticTypeAcquisition tsserver.js can be tamed and CPU usage drops to 0% almost immediately.
