microsoft / microsoft/vscode-remote-release

VSCode Devcontainers broke unexpectedly (probably because of unexpected extension update)

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#11,575 2 comments 0 reactions 1 assignee View on GitHub

@chrmarti is already working on this.

Since Apr 7, 2026.

containers info-needed
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Description

  • VSCode Version: 1.114.0
  • Local OS Version: Windows 11 25H2 10.0.26200
  • Remote OS Version: irrelevant
  • Remote Extension/Connection Type: Dev Containers
Container Logs 

[2026-04-07T21:07:18.662Z] Start: Run: podman -v
[2026-04-07T21:07:19.571Z] Stop (909 ms): Run: podman -v
[2026-04-07T21:07:19.571Z] Start: Resolving Remote
[2026-04-07T21:07:19.609Z] Start: Run: podman compose version --short
[2026-04-07T21:07:21.444Z] Stop (1835 ms): Run: podman compose version --short
[2026-04-07T21:07:21.446Z] Start: Run: podman compose version --short
[2026-04-07T21:07:21.719Z] findLocalWindowsExecutable: Exectuable 'podman compose' not found on PATH <<<truncated>>>
[2026-04-07T21:07:21.736Z] Error: Exectuable 'podman compose' not found on PATH <<<truncated>>>
[2026-04-07T21:07:21.737Z]     at AS (c:\Users\of4710\.vscode\extensions\ms-vscode-remote.remote-containers-0.447.0\dist\spec-node\devContainersSpecCLI.js:149:4280)
[2026-04-07T21:07:21.738Z]     at async c:\Users\of4710\.vscode\extensions\ms-vscode-remote.remote-containers-0.447.0\dist\spec-node\devContainersSpecCLI.js:149:1655
[2026-04-07T21:07:21.739Z]     at async wt (c:\Users\of4710\.vscode\extensions\ms-vscode-remote.remote-containers-0.447.0\dist\spec-node\devContainersSpecCLI.js:148:14916)
[2026-04-07T21:07:21.739Z]     at async c:\Users\of4710\.vscode\extensions\ms-vscode-remote.remote-containers-0.447.0\dist\spec-node\devContainersSpecCLI.js:465:2193
[2026-04-07T21:07:21.740Z]     at async ia (c:\Users\of4710\.vscode\extensions\ms-vscode-remote.remote-containers-0.447.0\dist\spec-node\devContainersSpecCLI.js:465:103)
[2026-04-07T21:07:21.740Z]     at async k9 (c:\Users\of4710\.vscode\extensions\ms-vscode-remote.remote-containers-0.447.0\dist\spec-node\devContainersSpecCLI.js:412:3470)
[2026-04-07T21:07:21.740Z]     at async AZ (c:\Users\of4710\.vscode\extensions\ms-vscode-remote.remote-containers-0.447.0\dist\spec-node\devContainersSpecCLI.js:485:4043)
[2026-04-07T21:07:21.740Z]     at async uC (c:\Users\of4710\.vscode\extensions\ms-vscode-remote.remote-containers-0.447.0\dist\spec-node\devContainersSpecCLI.js:485:4989)
[2026-04-07T21:07:21.741Z]     at async L5 (c:\Users\of4710\.vscode\extensions\ms-vscode-remote.remote-containers-0.447.0\dist\spec-node\devContainersSpecCLI.js:666:205)
[2026-04-07T21:07:21.741Z]     at async G5 (c:\Users\of4710\.vscode\extensions\ms-vscode-remote.remote-containers-0.447.0\dist\spec-node\devContainersSpecCLI.js:665:15084)
[2026-04-07T21:07:21.811Z] Stop (6844 ms): Run: C:\Users\of4710\AppData\Local\Programs\Microsoft VS Code\Code.exe c:\Users\of4710\.vscode\extensions\ms-vscode-remote.remote-containers-0.447.0\dist\spec-node\devContainersSpecCLI.js up --user-data-folder c:\Users\of4710\AppData\Roaming\Code\User\globalStorage\ms-vscode-remote.remote-containers\data --docker-path podman --docker-compose-path podman compose --container-session-data-folder /tmp/devcontainers-7ef14ae3-bfac-4b59-8bf8-1c82fc0339a81775596019944 --workspace-folder c:\Users\of4710\.projects_local\windows-reports --workspace-mount-consistency cached --gpu-availability detect --id-label devcontainer.local_folder=c:\Users\of4710\.projects_local\windows-reports --id-label devcontainer.config_file=c:\Users\of4710\.projects_local\windows-reports\.devcontainer\devcontainer.json --log-level debug --log-format json --config c:\Users\of4710\.projects_local\windows-reports\.devcontainer\devcontainer.json --default-user-env-probe loginInteractiveShell --mount type=volume,source=vscode,target=/vscode,external=true --skip-post-create --update-remote-user-uid-default on --mount-workspace-git-root --include-configuration --include-merged-configuration
[2026-04-07T21:07:21.813Z] Exit code 1
[2026-04-07T21:07:21.846Z] Command failed: C:\Users\of4710\AppData\Local\Programs\Microsoft VS Code\Code.exe c:\Users\of4710\.vscode\extensions\ms-vscode-remote.remote-containers-0.447.0\dist\spec-node\devContainersSpecCLI.js up --user-data-folder c:\Users\of4710\AppData\Roaming\Code\User\globalStorage\ms-vscode-remote.remote-containers\data --docker-path podman --docker-compose-path podman compose --container-session-data-folder /tmp/devcontainers-7ef14ae3-bfac-4b59-8bf8-1c82fc0339a81775596019944 --workspace-folder c:\Users\of4710\.projects_local\windows-reports --workspace-mount-consistency cached --gpu-availability detect --id-label devcontainer.local_folder=c:\Users\of4710\.projects_local\windows-reports --id-label devcontainer.config_file=c:\Users\of4710\.projects_local\windows-reports\.devcontainer\devcontainer.json --log-level debug --log-format json --config c:\Users\of4710\.projects_local\windows-reports\.devcontainer\devcontainer.json --default-user-env-probe loginInteractiveShell --mount type=volume,source=vscode,target=/vscode,external=true --skip-post-create --update-remote-user-uid-default on --mount-workspace-git-root --include-configuration --include-merged-configuration
[2026-04-07T21:07:21.849Z] Exit code 1

Steps to Reproduce (hopefully):

  1. Install Podman Desktop, a Podman machine based on WSL & docker-compose, all via Podman Desktop
  2. Configure dev.containers.dockerComposePath to "podman compose"
  3. Open a project with a .devcontainers config
  4. Select "> Dev Containers: Reopen in Container"
  5. See following error message: "Docker Compose required. Command not found: 'podman compose'"
Image

Does this issue occur when you try this locally?: irrelevant
Does this issue occur when you try this locally and all extensions are disabled?: not possible, because this also disables dev containers extension

What triggers me is that this worked today & now fails in the evening.

And from reading the error log, the issue is obvious: The extension now checks/assumes/requires that the setting is exactly the name of an existing binary. And while writing this, I remembered that I selected "docker-compose" in Podman Desktop (oppossed to "podman-compose", mind the hyphen). And this selection explained to me that "podman compose" (missing hyphen) is actually just an alias for the one I select in Podman Desktop. But its still annoying that this just fails suddenly after the PC was suspended for a few hours, with the error message (most important the dialog) being not actually helpful. And I probably only remembered it that fast because I just set up Podman Desktop & Devcontainers on this PC in the last week. And, afterall, IMO it is more resilient to configure "podman compose" instead of "docker-compose" as I, as an enduser, use Podman, and Podman just utilizies "docker-compose" as its Compose implementation.

My request from is: could you please either restore old behavior, or at least make the message more helpful?
(e.g. by directing users to the setting they need to change, and maybe add a check saying that when "docker-compose" is available instead, then direct users to try that out, or something like this) Thx

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