Fix Windows path quoting for usernames with special characters #16933
Add this suggestion to a batch that can be applied as a single commit.
This suggestion is invalid because no changes were made to the code.
Suggestions cannot be applied while the pull request is closed.
Suggestions cannot be applied while viewing a subset of changes.
Only one suggestion per line can be applied in a batch.
Add this suggestion to a batch that can be applied as a single commit.
Applying suggestions on deleted lines is not supported.
You must change the existing code in this line in order to create a valid suggestion.
Outdated suggestions cannot be applied.
This suggestion has been applied or marked resolved.
Suggestions cannot be applied from pending reviews.
Suggestions cannot be applied on multi-line comments.
Suggestions cannot be applied while the pull request is queued to merge.
Suggestion cannot be applied right now. Please check back later.
The Jupyter extension was failing on Windows when usernames contained special characters like parentheses, ampersands, or other shell metacharacters. This occurred because executable paths weren't being properly quoted during process execution.
Problem
When Windows usernames contain special characters (e.g.,
John(Contractor)
), the extension would fail with errors like:This happened because the
toCommandArgument()
function only checked for spaces but ignored other shell metacharacters like parentheses()
, ampersands&
, pipes|
, etc.Root Cause
The issue was in
src/platform/common/helpers.ts
wheretoCommandArgument()
used:This meant paths like
C:\Users\John(Contractor)\AppData\Local\env\python.exe
were not being quoted, causing Windows command shell to split the path at the first space or special character.Solution
Updated
toCommandArgument()
to check for all shell metacharacters that require quoting:Now paths with any special characters are properly quoted as
"C:\Users\John(Contractor)\AppData\Local\env\python.exe"
.Testing
Added comprehensive test coverage for:
&
,|
,<
,>
,^
)All existing tests continue to pass, ensuring no regressions.
Fixes #16932.
💡 You can make Copilot smarter by setting up custom instructions, customizing its development environment and configuring Model Context Protocol (MCP) servers. Learn more Copilot coding agent tips in the docs.