Task Runner Explorer can't load tasks

I'm using VS2015 and Gulp. I open the Task Runner Explorer and hit refresh, and this shows up in the log:

Failed to run "C:\Projects\Test\Gulpfile.js"...
cmd.exe /c gulp --tasks-simple
Error: `libsass` bindings not found in C:\Projects\Test\node_modules\gulp-sass\node_modules\node-sass\vendor\win32-ia32-11\binding.node. Try reinstalling `node-sass`?
	at Object.sass.getBinaryPath (C:\Projects\Test\node_modules\gulp-sass\node_modules\node-sass\lib\extensions.js:148:11)
	at Object.<anonymous> (C:\Projects\Test\node_modules\gulp-sass\node_modules\node-sass\lib\index.js:16:36)
	at Module._compile (module.js:456:26)
	at Object.Module._extensions..js (module.js:474:10)
	at Module.load (module.js:356:32)
	at Function.Module._load (module.js:312:12)
	at Module.require (module.js:364:17)
	at require (module.js:380:17)
	at Object.<anonymous> (C:\Projects\Test\node_modules\gulp-sass\index.js:163:21)
	at Module._compile (module.js:456:26)

So I try to run cmd.exe /c gulp --tasks-simple in PowerShell, in the same directory, and it works fine - it returns a list of tasks.

I'm also able to run my SASS-related tasks just fine, so I'm not sure why this is complaining about SASS when it's being run via VS but not directly on the command line.

I had the same problem migrating from VS2013 recently.

As Josh noted in his comment here Visual Studio 2015 ships with an older version of Node. In case you don't want to get stuck with whatever version of Node is built into Visual Studio, you can tell it to use the version you have already installed.

• Go to: Tools > Options > Projects and Solutions > External Web Tools
• Reorder so that $(PATH) is above $(DevEnvDir)\Extensions\Microsoft\Web Tools\External

This also applies to other tools like Grunt, Bower and Gulp.

Found this solution by Mads Kristensen here.

>For Visual Studio 2017, we can find the setting at
Tools > Options > Projects and Solutions > Web Package Management > External Web Tools

It seems gulp-sass searchs node-sass in a different location. Here is a temporary solution.

1. create a new directory named win32-ia32-11 inside c:\Projects\Test\node_modules\gulp-sass\node_modules\node-sass\vendor\

2. Goto https://github.com/sass/node-sass-binaries and download win32-ia32-11_binding.node.

3. Copy win32-ia32-11_binding.node file to c:\Projects\Test\node_modules\gulp-sass\node_modules\node-sass\vendor\win32-ia32-11\ and rename it to binding.node

I have tried all above solutions but it doesn't work and I found another solution here.

You have to force Visual Studio run with your Node.js version:

1. Go to Tools > Options in Visual Studio 2015
2. Go to Projects and Solutions > External Web Tools
3. Add the following path: C:\Program Files\nodejs

The only solution that solved my problem was re-installing NPM Task Runner. You can download it from following link at marketplace.
https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=MadsKristensen.NPMTaskRunner

node-sass runs an install script to download the required binary. If there are no environment variables, .npmrc variables or process arguments set then the binary is determined by using the current process platform, architecture and Node ABI version. Therefore, if you run node install in one application and then try to run node-sass in an application with a different platform/architecture/ABI, the binary won't have been downloaded. The solution is to manually download the binary or to fix the binary version using an environment variable (SASS_BINARY_NAME) or a .npmrc variable (sass_binary_name)

You can see the logic for this in the getBinaryPath function in node-sass\lib\extensions.js

See also: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/37986800/node-sass-could-not-find-a-binding-for-your-current-environment/43491478