-h/--help arg to program instead shows help for interpreter

Environment data

• VS Code version: 1.27.2
• Extension version (available under the Extensions sidebar): 2018.8.0
• OS and version: Windows 10 (1709)
• Python version (& distribution if applicable, e.g. Anaconda): Python 3.7.0
• Type of virtual environment used (N/A | venv | virtualenv | conda | …): N/A
• Relevant/affected Python packages and their versions: N/A

Actual behavior

my-file.py contains:

import argparse
version = '1.0.0'

def main():
    arg_parser = argparse.ArgumentParser(description='Foo')
    try:
        args = arg_parser.parse_args()
    except Exception as e:
        traceback.print_exc()
        exit(1)
    exit(0)

if __name__ == '__main__':
    main()

launch.json contains:

        {
            "name": "Python: Current File - help arg",
            "type": "python",
            "request": "launch",
            "program": "${file}",
            "console": "integratedTerminal",
            "args": [
                "--help"  // or "-h"
            ]
        },

Outputs the help for the python interpreter:

cd <my-workspace-path> && cmd /C "set "PYTHONIOENCODING=UTF-8" && set "PYTHONUNBUFFERED=1" && set "PYTHONPATH=c:\Users\<username>\.vscode\extensions\ms-python.python-2018.8.0\pythonFiles\experimental\ptvsd" && python -m ptvsd --host localhost --port 60918 <my-file-path>.py --help "
usage:
  python.exe -m ptvsd [-h] [-V] [--nodebug] [--host HOST | --server-host HOST] --port PORT -m MODULE [arg ...]
  python.exe -m ptvsd [-h] [-V] [--nodebug] [--host HOST | --server-host HOST] --port PORT FILENAME [arg ...]

positional arguments:
  filename

optional arguments:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  --nodebug
  --host HOST
  --server-host SERVER_HOST
  --port PORT
  -m MODULE
  --single-session
  -V, --version         show program's version number and exit

Then after some ten seconds or so, shows an error like:

[Window Title] Visual Studio Code

[Content] Timeout waiting for debugger connection

[Open launch.json] [Cancel]

Expected behavior

Evaluate the help arg as an argument to my file, i.e. respond with my file’s response to the -h arg

Steps to reproduce:

1. create a python script that handles -h and --help args
2. add a configuration to launch.json to call the script with one of these args
3. launch using the created configuration
4. check the output

Logs

No logs created

Other arguments appear to work as intended.

[KubaO]

ptvsd uses Python’s argparse.py: to leave arguments unparsed, precede them with the "--" argument. Thus, the launch.json should be:

    {
        "name": "Python: Current File - help arg",
        "type": "python",
        "request": "launch",
        "program": "${file}",
        "console": "integratedTerminal",
        "args": ["--", "--help"]
    }

Reference: https://stackoverflow.com/a/9084137/1329652

[brettcannon]

@ruyman-vfx nothing is planned to support passing arguments to ptvsd_launcher.py as there shouldn’t be anything you need there which isn’t provided as an argument in launch.json.