mypy/pylint paths are incorrectly synced and not found when custom config is removed

[ssbarnea]

Main issue that vscode seems to be unable to detect mypy/pylint when these are installed in PATH and when its custom settings are emptied, as seen in screenshot below.

The prompt to install appears and vscode successfully installs them but that does not help it find them, even if they are in PATH.

The workaround is to configure tool names inside their path settings instead of having them empty. Still this should not be needed and emptying them should reset to defaults.

Environment data

• Language Server version: v2021.11.1422169775
• OS and version: Fedora 34
• Python version (& distribution if applicable, e.g. Anaconda): 3.10

Expected behaviour

• clearing mypy/pylint paths setting in settings should enable python extension from finding the tools that itself installed seconds ago.
• vscode should not sync path settings as pylint or mypy by default as they are obviously not portable

Shortly: empty configuration of mypy/pylint paths should assume these are to be found in PATH, but this does not happen

Actual behaviour

• vscode complains about not being able to find mypy/pylint when running on a remote host, basically because it did sync settings.
• After configuring those paths to not sync and clearing them as prompt to install missing tools appears. That is indeed a good sign.
• After vscode itself installs the missing tools (using --user), it still fails to find them. As seen in screenshot below it lacks the ability to look inside PATH by default.

Logs

XXX

Code Snippet / Additional information

XXX

[jakebailey]

The Pylance extension doesn't do anything with pylint or mypy; that's the Python extension's purview. Transferring.

[karthiknadig]

@ssbarnea You have to set the path to the mypy or pylint binary. When we install, we attempt to import having mypy or pylint binaries on path is not sufficient to import. so if you want to use the ones on path you have to specify the path.

essentially if from your terminal you can do python -m pylint works then it should work, if not then you need to specify the binary path via python.linting.mypyPath or python.linting.pylintPath

[ssbarnea]

They work fine in terminal with both cli executable and module calling (python -m foo).

The problem is that if you delete the content of the config optional (set them empty) it will stop working. That should not happen because empty value should mean "use default value" like "pylint". When you install fresh they are automatically populated with these default values and that is good, but what it someone configures them wrongly (like settings sync feature) and you want to revert to defaults...

Basically the bug is about resetting these config options.

IMHO, empty string should be the same thing as the default value.

[karthiknadig]

@ssbarnea I agree, empty should mean the same as default in this case.