Running a simple express app with ts-node-dev and get error: False expression: Non-string value passed to `ts.resolveTypeReferenceDirective`

Question

I am new to typescript and express. I am trying to run the simplest express app using ts-node-dev, but get the following error.

> ./node_modules/.bin/ts-node-dev src/index.ts                                                 16:07:40
[INFO] 16:07:42 ts-node-dev ver. 1.1.8 (using ts-node ver. 9.1.1, typescript ver. 4.7.2)
Compilation error in /home/lht/microservice/ticketing/auth/src/index.ts
Error: Debug Failure. False expression: Non-string value passed to `ts.resolveTypeReferenceDirective`, likely by a wrapping package working with an outdated `resolveTypeReferenceDirectives` signature. This is probably not a problem in TS itself.
    at Object.<anonymous> (/home/lht/microservice/ticketing/auth/src/index.ts:1:7)
    at Module._compile (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:778:30)
    at Module._compile (/home/lht/microservice/ticketing/auth/node_modules/source-map-support/source-map-support.js:568:25)
    at Module.m._compile (/tmp/ts-node-dev-hook-8101223397369532.js:69:33)
    at Module._extensions..js (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:789:10)
    at require.extensions.(anonymous function) (/tmp/ts-node-dev-hook-8101223397369532.js:71:20)
    at Object.nodeDevHook [as .ts] (/home/lht/microservice/ticketing/auth/node_modules/ts-node-dev/lib/hook.js:63:13)
    at Module.load (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:653:32)
    at tryModuleLoad (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:593:12)
    at Function.Module._load (internal/modules/cjs/loader.js:585:3)
[ERROR] 16:07:42 Error: Debug Failure. False expression: Non-string value passed to `ts.resolveTypeReferenceDirective`, likely by a wrapping package working with an outdated `resolveTypeReferenceDirectives` signature. This is probably not a problem in TS itself.

The following is my index.ts file.

import express from "express";
import { json } from "body-parser";

const app = express();
app.use(json());

app.listen(3000, () => {
  console.log("Listening on port 3000!");
});

This is my package.json file

{
  "name": "auth",
  "version": "1.0.0",
  "description": "",
  "main": "index.js",
  "scripts": {
    "start": "ts-node src/index.ts"
  },
  "keywords": [],
  "author": "",
  "license": "ISC",
  "devDependencies": {},
  "dependencies": {
    "@types/express": "^4.17.13",
    "@types/node": "^17.0.35",
    "express": "^4.18.1",
    "ts-node": "^10.8.0",
    "ts-node-dev": "^1.1.8",
    "typescript": "^4.7.2"
  }
}

I wonder if there are some configurations that I am doing are wrong. Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

Just change the ts-node-dev version from 1.1.8 to 2.0.0-0 in my package.json file, then run npm install again, and the error disappears.

{
  "name": "auth",
  "version": "1.0.0",
  "description": "",
  "main": "index.js",
  "scripts": {
    "start": "ts-node src/index.ts"
  },
  "keywords": [],
  "author": "",
  "license": "ISC",
  "devDependencies": {},
  "dependencies": {
    "@types/express": "^4.17.13",
    "@types/node": "^17.0.35",
    "express": "^4.18.1",
    "ts-node": "^10.8.0",
    "ts-node-dev": "^2.0.0-0",
    "typescript": "^4.7.2"
  }
}

Answer 2

I observed, why other services are working fine, except one. I found that, the failing service was getting compiled with different TS version. After I changed TS version

"typescript": "^4.6.3"

to

"typescript": "4.6.4"

that also solved the issue.

Answer 3

I ran into this from a freshly built typeorm app (npx create-express-typescript-application my-app -t typeorm). Bumping ts-node to ^10.8.0 solved the issue.

Answer 4

A quick and easy fix is to run npm install typescript@latest ts-node@latest. The problem may be the old ts-node is incompatible with the latest typescript 4.7.x release and upgrade them fix my issue.

Answer 5

I just ran into this problem when trying to run a node server inside a yarn workspace with nodemon. Running nodemon from the workspace sub folder worked, but not from workspace root folder itself.

Script in worspace sub folder looks like this

"dev": "nodemon"

and from root folder

"dev:my-service": "yarn workspace my-service dev"

I solved it by specifically adding ts-node as a dev dependency to the "my-service" workspace

Answer 6

just change the version of ts-node

to

    "ts-node": "10.8.1",

run npm i or yarn

Answer 7

Run:

npm uninstall ts-node && npm uninstall ts-node-dev

and then run:

npm i ts-node && npm i ts-node-dev --save-dev