Existing methods to limit Node.js process runtime, like OS timeouts or setTimeout, are inconsistent, lack visibility into why a process is stuck, and fail to interrupt busy loops or native code blocks reliably.

OS-level timeouts vary across platforms and provide no diagnostic info; JavaScript timers only fire when the event loop is free, missing busy or blocked states; signals triggered diagnostics have similar limitations.

Introduced a native watchdog thread that interrupts the main thread after a specified timeout, prints the JavaScript stack and event loop resource info if available, optionally outputs a full diagnostic report, and exits the process with code 124, ensuring consistent and informative timeouts across platforms.

Native timeout enforcement with diagnostic output improves reliability and debuggability of long-running or stuck Node.js processes, but requires careful integration with other runtime options and attention to edge cases like CPU starvation or platform-specific behaviors.