Eslint client couldn't create connection to server after installing new VS Code version

[jquintozamora]

macOS Tahoe Version 26.3

VS Code version:
Version: 1.110.1
Commit: 61b3d0ab13be7dda2389f1d3e60a119c7f660cc3
Date: 2026-03-06T23:03:27.520Z
Electron: 39.6.0
ElectronBuildId: 13330601
Chromium: 142.0.7444.265
Node.js: 22.22.0
V8: 14.2.231.22-electron.0
OS: Darwin arm64 25.3.0

2026-03-09 08:26:30.830 [info] ESLint server is starting.
2026-03-09 08:26:30.830 [info] ESLint server stopped.
2026-03-09 08:26:30.830 [error] ESLint client: couldn't create connection to server.
Error: spawn EBADF
at ChildProcess.spawn (node:internal/child_process:420:11)
at spawn (node:child_process:820:9)
at fork (node:child_process:175:10)
at e.fork (node:electron/js2c/node_init:2:19269)
at o (/Users/jose/.vscode/extensions/dbaeumer.vscode-eslint-3.0.24/client/out/extension.js:1:354855)
at new Promise ()
at /Users/jose/.vscode/extensions/dbaeumer.vscode-eslint-3.0.24/client/out/extension.js:1:354431
at async T.createConnection (/Users/jose/.vscode/extensions/dbaeumer.vscode-eslint-3.0.24/client/out/extension.js:1:147929)
at async T.start (/Users/jose/.vscode/extensions/dbaeumer.vscode-eslint-3.0.24/client/out/extension.js:1:138179)
2026-03-09 08:26:30.830 [error] Starting the server failed.
Error: spawn EBADF
at ChildProcess.spawn (node:internal/child_process:420:11)
at spawn (node:child_process:820:9)
at fork (node:child_process:175:10)
at e.fork (node:electron/js2c/node_init:2:19269)
at o (/Users/jose/.vscode/extensions/dbaeumer.vscode-eslint-3.0.24/client/out/extension.js:1:354855)
at new Promise ()
at /Users/jose/.vscode/extensions/dbaeumer.vscode-eslint-3.0.24/client/out/extension.js:1:354431
at async T.createConnection (/Users/jose/.vscode/extensions/dbaeumer.vscode-eslint-3.0.24/client/out/extension.js:1:147929)
at async T.start (/Users/jose/.vscode/extensions/dbaeumer.vscode-eslint-3.0.24/client/out/extension.js:1:138179)

[dbaeumer]

José Quinto (@jquintozamora) are you still seeing this. I am not able to reproduce it.

[brikr]

I get this error from the plugin pretty consistently. Other research I've done makes it sound like this could happen when too many files are open at once on macOS (the Code project I experience this with corroborates that).

I think part of the problem is that the ESLint server starts up when VSCode starts up (fine by default), but once it hits this error there's no way to try to get it to start up again after the filesystem dies down a bit. The Restart ESLint Server action fails since it can't find a server to stop before starting again.

If the restart action at least worked after startup, this might become less of an issue because I could just boot the ESLint server up after VSCode has finished intializing/indexing things.

If there's any other debug information I can provide let me know, since I am able to repro the error quite often as is.

[dbaeumer]

This is very likely caused by libuv/libuv#5204.

Even if we fix the Restart to make it a start (which we should) it will not make the server start due to the libuv issue.