I've always had trouble using the given node -r tsconfig-paths/register path/to/main function from the command line, my paths never import correctly and I always seem to have an error when running after a build. After doing a bunch of digging around through packages and StackOverflow Q&A's I finally found a way to use tsconfig-paths programatically.

The tsconfig-bootstrap.js file makes use of tsconfig-pathsto register the paths from the compiler, and more than likely does exactly what tsconfig-paths/register is supposed to do. After requiring your tsconfig file you can access your baseUrl and paths via the JSON scheme of the config file to 100% programatically set your path imports to be correct, so that is anything changes in your config file this function doesn't need any chagning!

After you have the function set up, jsut add the following segment to your npm start command (whatever you have it called) and watch as your server fires up seamlessly:

# normal start without bootstrap
node path/to/main.js

# with tsconfig-bootstrap
node -r tsconfig-bootstrap.js path/to/main.js

Hope this helps out someone who's looking for an answer!