Debugger not working invalid (or missing) template file

Describe the bug

Lambda debug does not works, when press to “Start Debugging” button an error appear:

Invalid (or missing) template file (path must be workspace-relative, or absolute):

To Reproduce

1. Open template.yaml
2. Press on button “Add Debug Configuration”
3. Configure Lambda payload and environmentVariables (optional)
4. Press on “Start Debugging”

The .vscode/launch.json file look like this:

{
  "configurations": [
    {
      "type": "aws-sam",
      "request": "direct-invoke",
      "name": "MyFunction",
      "invokeTarget": {
        "target": "template",
        "templatePath": "template.yaml",
        "logicalId": "MyFunction"
      },
      "lambda": {
        "runtime": "nodejs12.x",
        "payload": {
          "path": "event.json"
        },
        "environmentVariables": {
          "MY_VARIABLE": "test"
        }
      }
    }
  ]
}

Expected behavior

The Lambda function start locally and VSCode debug is attached to it

Desktop (please complete the following information):

• OS: Linux
• Visual Studio Code Version: 1.51.1
• AWS Toolkit Version: v1.15.0

Additional context

The template file path is correct position, I tested with a simple “stat/file/cat” in terminal and the path is correct, same behaviour using relative or absolute path.

$ file template.yaml
template.yaml: ASCII text

$ file /home/me/project/template.yaml # just an example or my absolute path
template.yaml: ASCII text

The template file is correct, I currently deploy it as SAM application without any issue.

[thefat32]

Any idea on how to debug this problem?

If the template.yaml file contents don’t look like a SAM file, Toolkit will skip it. What do the contents look like? Also, is the file part of the vscode workspace?

The file el is generated by CDK and I can use it just fine via command line sam local invoke .... But AWS Toolkit does not load it preventing me from using sam cli Debug Configuration. We are starting the sam local invoke debugger with a VS Code preLaunchTask and attaching to the debugger to workaround this problem but it would be nice for AWS Toolkit to support the same templates sam cli does

[justinmk3]

We should surface this somehow, will keep this open to track that.