This is a new feature to add USB, HID and Serial device access to the desktop by extending the existing WebUSB, WebHID and WebSerial functionality already offered in the web version #152310.

Since Electron version 25, Web-* device access has been possible using the functionality described here: https://www.electronjs.org/docs/latest/tutorial/devices

This ability is awesome because it allows access to functionality in Chrome already shipped as part of VS Code and means extension developers no longer have to include external packages such as node-usb or SerialPort. In many cases this approach should be more stable and reliable, too (e.g. chrome uses winusb for device access over libusb as used in node-usb).

To implement this addition, I've wired up a QuickPick dropdown for the user to choose the requested device leveraging Electron's APIs. Unfortunately the cleanest way I've been able to find to communicate between the electron-main and browser process is via the globals API. Happy to hear of a better way.

USB Selector:

Serial Selector:

HID Selector:

Please note: As this utilises the existing features in chrome, obtaining a concrete device after authorising it is only possible in the desktop web extension host. Therefore this feature is only available to pure web extensions (those without a main entrypoint in package.json).

To test, create a UI only VS Code extension which calls one of the existing experimental commands for requesting device access:

• workbench.experimental.requestUsbDevice
• workbench.experimental.requestSerialPort
• workbench.experimental.requestHidDevice