IBM Blockchain platform cannot rebuild native dependencies

I trying to get the IBM Blockchain platform to work in Visual studio code (on Linux), but it keeps coming back with:

Could not rebuild native dependencies Failed to execute command "npm" with  arguments 
"rebuild, grpc, --target=6.1.5, --runtime=electron, --update-binary, --fallback-to-build, -- 
target_arch=x64, --dist-url=https://atom.io/download/electron" return code 1. Please ensure 
that you have node and npm installed

I have node and npm installed

node -v
v10.17.0

and

npm -v
6.11.3

satisfying the constraints. I have visual studio code version 1.41.1. What could be thie issue?