fix(shared): read the Machine and User registry PATH scopes on Windows

[hey-jj]

TITLE: fix(shared): read the Machine and User registry PATH scopes on Windows

Fixes #7406.

When the app launches with a stale Windows environment, for example after Node was installed later in the same desktop session, the Windows PATH repair never finds the registered Node directory and the one-click provider update dies with NotFound: ChildProcess.spawn. The repair probes PowerShell with an unscoped [Environment]::GetEnvironmentVariable('PATH'), which returns the PATH the probe inherited from the app itself, while the directory it needs sits in the Machine or User registry scope that the probe never reads.

What changed

buildWindowsEnvironmentCaptureCommand now reads the Machine and User registry scopes for PATH alongside the existing unscoped read and joins the non-empty values, process value first. Every other captured name keeps the single unscoped read. The new test pins the exact generated statement sequence for the PATH capture and pins that FNM_DIR keeps its unscoped read.

Why this shape

The registry scopes hold what a fresh sign-in would see, which is what the repair is trying to reconstruct. Ordering is preserved on purpose. The process value stays first in the join, so every directory that resolved before still wins, and the registry values only add what was missing. mergePathValues already drops the duplicates case-insensitively downstream.

Testing

• npx vitest run --root packages/shared shell.test.ts passes, 30 tests.
• tsgo --noEmit is clean for packages/shared.
• The new assertion pins the full ordered statement sequence as text, because the generated command cannot execute on the machines that run this suite. The pin fails if the scoped reads are discarded, reordered, joined with the wrong separator, or left unfiltered.
• On Windows 11 with process PATH limited to C:\Windows\System32 and Node registered only in the User registry PATH, the repaired environment contains the Node directory, resolveSpawnCommand("npm", ["--version"]) resolves the full npm.CMD path with shell: true, and the command exits 0.

---

Note

Medium Risk
Touches core Windows spawn/PATH repair used for Node and CLI resolution; behavior change is narrow (PATH capture only) but affects command discovery when the inherited PATH is stale.

Overview
Fixes Windows PATH repair when the app inherits a stale process PATH (e.g. Node added to User/Machine registry after launch). buildWindowsEnvironmentCaptureCommand now, for PATH only, reads the unscoped value plus Machine and User registry scopes, joins non-empty segments with ; (process value first); other captured names still use a single unscoped read. Downstream mergePathValues continues to dedupe.

A new unit test locks the generated PowerShell statement order for PATH and confirms vars like FNM_DIR do not get scoped reads.

^{Reviewed by Cursor Bugbot for commit 8ff87e5. Bugbot is set up for automated code reviews on this repo. Configure here.}

Note

Fix readEnvironmentFromWindowsShell to read Machine and User registry PATH scopes on Windows

Previously, buildWindowsEnvironmentCaptureCommand in shell.ts read PATH using a single unscoped [Environment]::GetEnvironmentVariable call, which only returned the process-level value. Now, when the variable name is PATH, the generated PowerShell reads from the process, Machine, and User registry scopes separately and joins the non-null results with ;. Non-PATH variables continue to use the single unscoped read.

^{Macroscope summarized 8ff87e5.}

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[macroscopeapp]

Approvability

Verdict: Not approved

Macroscope's review found this PR not approvable — This PR changes runtime behavior for Windows PATH resolution by reading additional registry scopes (Machine and User). While well-tested and scoped to PATH only, this alters how environment variables are assembled and warrants human verification of the intended behavior.

^{You can add or adjust custom eligibility rules. Learn more.}

[t3dotgg]

Note

🤖 GPT-5.6 Sol responding on behalf of Theo

We're closing this PR as we clean up the T3 Code backlog. Thank you for taking the time to put this together.

We are keeping OPEN #8465 as the review path for refreshing the Windows PATH before provider checks. The registry-scope tests here remain useful reference.

If you believe we closed this in error, please reopen the PR and leave a comment explaining what we missed.