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[Issue]: Installing with a separate Admin account means that Path is not correct in PowerShell #1260

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justin-mellor opened this issue May 8, 2025 · 0 comments · May be fixed by #1261
Open

[Issue]: Installing with a separate Admin account means that Path is not correct in PowerShell #1260

justin-mellor opened this issue May 8, 2025 · 0 comments · May be fixed by #1261

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@justin-mellor
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What happened?

Installed using UAC with a different admin account

In PowerShell $env:PATH returned %NVM_HOME% and %NVM_SYMLINK% not the expanded variables. It sometimes worked in Command Prompt.

This is because the User Environment variables are created against a different user to current user, and NVM_HOME NVM_SYMLINK and Path are all REG_EXPAND_SZ so indeterminate which order they will be evaluated in.

This meant that nvm was not always found

What did you expect to happen?

$env:PATH should have included the actual install locations

Version

1.2.0 or newer (Default)

Which version of Windows?

Windows 11+ (Default)

Which locale?

English (Default)

Which shell are you running NVM4W in?

PowerShell

User Permissions?

Standard Use, Non-Elevated

Is Developer Mode enabled?

No (Default)

Relevant log/console output

PS C:\AzureDevOps\BottKitt\Deployment> $env:PATH
C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Enterprise\Common7\IDE\CommonExtensions\Microsoft\TestWindow;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Enterprise\Common7\IDE\CommonExtensions\Microsoft\TeamFoundation\Team Explorer;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Enterprise\MSBuild\Current\bin\Roslyn;C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SDKs\Windows\v10.0A\bin\NETFX 4.8 Tools\;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Enterprise\Common7\IDE\CommonExtensions\Microsoft\FSharp\Tools;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Enterprise\Team Tools\DiagnosticsHub\Collector;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Enterprise\Common7\IDE\Extensions\Microsoft\CodeCoverage.Console;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Enterprise\\MSBuild\Current\Bin\amd64;C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Enterprise\Common7\IDE\;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Enterprise\Common7\Tools\;C:\Program Files\PowerShell\7;C:\Program Files\Microsoft SDKs\Azure\CLI2\wbin;C:\WINDOWS\system32;C:\WINDOWS;C:\WINDOWS\System32\Wbem;C:\WINDOWS\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\;C:\WINDOWS\System32\OpenSSH\;C:\ProgramData\chocolatey\bin;C:\Program Files\Cloudflare\Cloudflare WARP\;C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\Client SDK\ODBC\170\Tools\Binn\;C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\150\Tools\Binn\;C:\Program Files\dotnet\;C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SQL Server\160\DTS\Binn\;C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SQL Server\160\Tools\Binn\;C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\160\Tools\Binn\;C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\160\DTS\Binn\;C:\Program Files\Microsoft VS Code\bin;C:\Program Files\PowerShell\7\;%NVM_HOME%;%NVM_SYMLINK%;C:\Users\Justin.Mellor\AppData\Local\Microsoft\WindowsApps;C:\Users\Justin.Mellor\.dotnet\tools;C:\Users\Justin.Mellor\AppData\Local\Programs\Git\cmd;;C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Enterprise\Common7\IDE\VC\Linux\bin\ConnectionManagerExe

Debug Output

Justin.Mellor is not using admin or elevated rights.

Windows Version:        10.0 (Build 26100)

Windows Developer Mode: UNKNOWN

NVM4W Version:          1.2.2
NVM4W Author Bridge:    1.0.1
NVM4W Path:             C:\Users\Justin.Mellor\AppData\Local\nvm\nvm.exe
NVM4W Settings:         C:\Users\Justin.Mellor\AppData\Local\nvm\settings.txt
NVM_HOME:               C:\Users\Justin.Mellor\AppData\Local\nvm
NVM_SYMLINK:            C:\nvm4w\nodejs
Node Installations:     C:\Users\Justin.Mellor\AppData\Local\nvm
Default Architecture:   64-bit
Mirrors:                No mirrors configured
HTTP Proxy:             none

Total Node.js Versions: 1
Active Node.js Version: v20.17.0

IPv6 is enabled. This has been known to slow downloads significantly.

No problems detected.

⚠️  NVM for Windows will eventually be succeeded by Author/Runtime


Find help at https://github.com/coreybutler/nvm-windows/wiki/Common-Issues

Anything else?

The problem comes because the installer uses RegWriteExpandStringValue() for NVM_HOME and NVM_SYMLINK. It should be using RegWriteStringValue() because these variables do not need to use expansion. This ensures that Path can expand the values as it will be evaluated after.
I have a PR for a fix
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Create NVM_HOME and NVM_SYMLINK as REG_SZ not REG_EXPAND_SZ justin-mellor/nvm-windows
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@justin-mellor