nRF Connect on VSCode (Ubuntu) Gets stuck at startup

[Sam-IIT]

I've seen many post on the forum about the extension getting stuck at startup. 
NRF CONNECT FOR DESKTOP VSCODE EXTENSION IS NOT LOADING 
NRF extension in VS Code is not loading up 

Apparently my issue is a bit different since any of the proposed fix do not work. 

While trying use the nRF Connect extension pack, the extension freezes on startup with an endless wheel

Weird enough a process "/usr/bin/zsh -i" is launched and gets stuck using 100% of a single CPU. If I kill that process, the extension goes back on track and I'm able to load and run a simple blinky program. Needless to say that having to kill such process every time I launch VSCode is a bit uncomfortable. 

Some info:

• Ubuntu 22.04. Latest VSCode and Extension. Zsh as native shell
• Yes, I do use zsh and I never had any issue with other extensions. The shell is configured to run correctly with zsh in VSCode. 
• Yes, I set also the full python path for the Kconfig. just in case. 
• No, removing "nRF-connect extension" pack does not make "nRF-connect" to work. 

Any suggestion?

[Priyanka]

Hi Sam,

Could you maybe try to use, say, bash instead of zsh. Just to rule out where the issue originates from. Do you still get an issue?

Regards,

Priyanka

[Sam-IIT]

Hi Pryanka,

thank you for your quick response. Changing it back to bash actually works but id like to avoid that since would require a bit of re-configuring for other tools.

[Priyanka]

Hi Sam,

I have consulted with the extension team, and it looks like the issue is ‘>' in the last line of PROMPT variable. The PROMPT environmental variable is a template that sets how the shell prompt looks like and is set somewhere in the user’s .zshrc file. ‘/bin/zh -i’ never resolves because of mentioned ‘>' that opens another shell inside already open one that never closes.

I suggest that you try to find where the PROMPT variable is defined and remove the '>’.

Hopefully this will be resolved in the coming release, but for the time being this is the workaround. Hope this helps.

Regards,

Priyanka

[Sam-IIT]

Hi Priyanka,

thank you for the feedback. The issue was definitely that even though I didn't resolved it by simply removing ">". 
I was using the "jonathan" theme of zsh 
https://travis.media/blog/top-12-oh-my-zsh-themes-for-productive-developers/

But editing the PROMPT variable at the end by removing ">" didn't fix it. So I changed the theme altogether to something different and it worked.

Thank you!

[Priyanka]

Glad to hear that it works

-Priyanka