How does one set up the Visual Studio Code compiler/debugger to GCC?

Question

I am programming in C in Visual Studio Code, but I can't compile, as VSC only offers three compilers built in - Node.js, C# Mono, and Extension development. After a little bit of digging I came across the Visual Studio Marketplace. This seemed like the right sort of thing, but only four uncommon languages were there.

I can only assume that C debugging support is built in, I just can't find it or I am going the wrong way about doing it. I attempted to create a new launch.json (the manifest that seems to hold the compiling/debugging settings for each file) and manually entering the GCC binaries that I have, but that didn't end up working. I'm currently stuck manually compiling the C source file I am working on through command prompt.

Would really help if someone could point me in the right direction on what to do.

tl;dr - Help from anyone debugging C in Visual Studio Code

Windows 8, if that matters

Cheers!

Answer 1

Caution

A friendly reminder: The following tutorial is for Linux user instead of Windows

Tutorial

If you want to debug your c++ code with GDB

You can read this ( Debugging your code ) article from Visual Studio Code official website.

Step 1: Compilation

You need to set up task.json for compilation of your cpp file

or simply type in the following command in the command window

g++ -g file.cpp -o file.exe 

to generate a debuggable .exe file

Step 2: Set up the launch.json file

To enable debugging, you will need to generate a launch.json file

follow the launch.json example or google others

Step 3: Press (Ctrl+F5) to start compiling

this launch.json file will launch the configuration when you press the shortcut (Ctrl+F5)

Enjoy it!

ps. For those who want to set up tasks.json, you can read this from vscode official (-> TypeScript Hello World)

Answer 2

Press Ctrl + Shift + P to pull up the Command Pallette, and Type ext install cpptools. It will install everything you need to debug C and C++.

Debugging in VS code is very complete, but if you just need to compile and run:

https://code.visualstudio.com/docs/languages/cpp

Look in the debugging section, and it will explain everything.