Environment variables in path are not expanded in integrated terminal or Code-launched command prompt

[rummelsworth]

• VSCode Version: 1.12.1
• OS Version: Windows 10 Pro 1607 14393.969

Steps to reproduce

1. Have node installed and on your path.
2. Launch integrated terminal (PowerShell).
3. Type node, press enter.

The terminal output is node : The term 'node' is not recognized [...].

Recognition of node still fails if I instead first enter cmd (which works and opens a subshell) and try it there.

More details

Also occurs for npm and nvm, but not for git. Built-ins and other standard things (like dir, cmd, notepad, etc) work fine.

I use nvm-windows. It's managing 7.4.0 and 7.9.0 for me. This behavior happens when using either.

Was occurring in non-integrated CMD and PS terminals until I restarted my computer. After restarting my computer, non-integrated terminals do not show this behavior (and so are a workaround for me right now). I had not restarted my computer since initially updating from 1.11 to 1.12.0 a few days ago, and I hadn't tried any of this since before that.

[Tyriar]

@wrummler What's the output of this?

Get-ChildItem Env:Path

Also can you share your settings.json file?

[rummelsworth]

Within integrated terminal (unexpanded NVM path variables):

> $Env:Path
C:\Python27\;C:\Python27\Scripts;C:\Windows\system32;C:\Windows;C:\Windows\System32\Wbem;C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\;C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\Windows Performance Toolkit\;C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\130\Tools\Binn\;C:\Program Files\dotnet\;%NVM_HOME%;%NVM_SYMLINK%;C:\Users\wrummler\AppData\Local\Microsoft\WindowsApps;C:\Users\wrummler\AppData\Local\Programs\Git\cmd;C:\Users\wrummler\AppData\Local\atom\bin

Within standalone terminal (correctly expanded path variables):

> $Env:Path
C:\Python27\;C:\Python27\Scripts;C:\Windows\system32;C:\Windows;C:\Windows\System32\Wbem;C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\;C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\Windows Performance Toolkit\;C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\130\Tools\Binn\;C:\Program Files\dotnet\;C:\Users\wrummler\AppData\Roaming\nvm;C:\Program Files\nodejs;C:\Users\wrummler\AppData\Local\Microsoft\WindowsApps;C:\Users\wrummler\AppData\Local\Programs\Git\cmd;C:\Users\wrummler\AppData\Local\atom\bin

Same contrasting behavior when I switch to CMD as integrated terminal shell.

User settings:

{
    "editor.renderWhitespace": "all",
    "editor.rulers": [80],
    "editor.minimap.enabled": true,
    "workbench.iconTheme": "vs-seti",
    "terminal.integrated.shell.windows": "C:\\Windows\\Sysnative\\WindowsPowerShell\\v1.0\\powershell.exe",
    "window.zoomLevel": 0
}

Workspace settings:

{
  "files.exclude": {
    "**/.git": true,
    "src/**/*.js": true
  }
}

[Tyriar]

@daviwil @joaomoreno have you ever seen this? Environment variables in the %PATH% not being expanded?

[rummelsworth]

Another possibly interesting detail:

When I launch a standalone terminal from within Code via Ctrl+Shift+C and run echo %path%, the output shows the unexpanded variables.

When I launch a standalone terminal otherwise (e.g. Windows key; "cmd"; Enter key) and run echo %path%, the output shows the correct expansions.

[joaomoreno]

Never seen this, no.

[rummelsworth]

Another detail:

When I run Code as administrator, this doesn't happen. Environment variables expand as expected.

Why would this behavior have changed from 1.11 to 1.12? Is it really a change with Code or is it some coincidence with my particular machine and account configuration? (Not demanding answers, just trying to actively rubberduck.)

[af4jm]

I'm seeing a different symptom of what is probably the same issue...

The following in settings.json fails to start the shell with error code 1, replacing the environment variable with the hard-coded path works, as does putting "%GIT_HOME%\git-cmd.exe" --command=usr/bin/bash.exe into Start > Run...

"terminal.integrated.shell.windows": "%GIT_HOME%\\git-cmd.exe",
"terminal.integrated.shellArgs.windows": ["--command=usr/bin/bash.exe"],

Work-around, of course, is to hard-code the path, but I'm syncing settings between different computers where that path is on different drives, which makes integrated-terminal a non-starter for me until either this is fixed or VSCode supports multiple terminals on a platform.

[Tyriar]

@af4jm that one is a separate issue and needs VS Code to expand the variables, I suspect the OP's issue is related to PowerShell misbehaving.

[rummelsworth]

@Tyriar Command Prompt terminals demonstrate this behavior as well. The common factor is that the affected terminals are all launched by Code. Terminals launched outside of Code expand variables normally. Also, Code's terminals expand variables normally when running Code as an administrator (with a local machine account, vs. my "normal" account on my corporate domain).