How to add something to the PATH on Windows?

[nilsreichardt]

If you are looking for help, please confirm the following...

• I confirm I have searched the Docs, Codemagic Sample Projects, and GitHub Discussions.
• I confirm the software versions on my local computer match the ones in CI environment (e.g. Xcode version, Gradle version). See here
• I confirm I am able to do a fresh clone of the repository and build the project on my local computer.

Which mobile framework are you using?

Flutter (Dart)

Steps to reproduce

Hey 👋 I'm writing the docs for using Shorebird and Codemagic on Windows machines: https://docs.shorebird.dev/ci/codemagic.

Unfortunately, I'm unable to add Shorebird to the PATH. How can I achieve this? On macOS/Linux I can just run echo PATH="$HOME/.shorebird/bin:$PATH" >> $CM_ENV.

My current workflow (the issue is in the Add-Content -Path $env:CM_ENV -Value):

workflows:
  example:
    name: Example
    environment:
      groups:
        - shorebird
      flutter: stable
    instance_type: windows_x2
    scripts:
      - name: 🐦 Setup Shorebird
        script: |
          Set-ExecutionPolicy RemoteSigned -scope CurrentUser # Needed to execute remote scripts
          iwr -UseBasicParsing 'https://raw.githubusercontent.com/shorebirdtech/install/main/install.ps1'|iex

          Add-Content -Path $env:CM_ENV -Value PATH=C:\Users\builder\.shorebird\bin:$PATH
      - name: 🚀 Shorebird Patch
        script: |
          echo "Patching Shorebird"
          shorebird --version

Docs on how to add an environment variable:

  scripts:
    - name: Save variable to ENV file
      script: | 
        Add-Content -Path $env:CM_ENV -Value "KEY=value"

https://docs.codemagic.io/yaml-basic-configuration/using-environment-variables/

Expected results

I want to be able to run shorebird commands.

Actual results

Either I'm getting directly error code 1 or

shorebird : The term 'shorebird' is not recognized as the name of a cmdlet, function, script file, or operable 
program. Check the spelling of the name, or if a path was included, verify that the path is correct and try again.
At C:\Users\builder\AppData\Local\Temp\build_script_4_1_o6d5lac6.ps1:1 char:1
+ shorebird release android --force
+ ~~~~~~~~~
    + CategoryInfo          : ObjectNotFound: (shorebird:String) [], CommandNotFoundException
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : CommandNotFoundException

Build id (optional)

64c2da967b1051fc62323c64

[eseidel]

Hmm, the Shorebird installer tries to add shorebird to the path, but maybe it's not working in the CM environment?
https://github.com/shorebirdtech/install/blob/main/install.ps1#L48

[mohammedbabelly20]

Hey @eseidel,
Yes, actually the path is added correctly to the User path.
However it seems like PowerShell can't find this path, whereas Command Prompt or Git Bash are working fine, and because Codemagic's scripts are executed in PS so @nilsreichardt is facing this issue.

I've done some experiments on a physical Windows machine and I didn't see any issues.
Then I tried installing Shorebird on a Windows Server 2019 AWS EC2 instance, (same version that CM uses) and I got the same issue, which is PowerShell is not able to find this path, even though the path is added.
However, when I installed Shorebird on a Windows Server 2022 AWS EC2 instance, everything was going well.

[nilsreichardt]

Thanks for taking a look into that, @codemagic-mohammed <3

For me, there are two open questions:

• The initial question on how to add something to the PATH on Windows is still a bit unclear to me
• Needs this to be fixed on Shorebird side or Codemagic side? Or needs nothing to be fixed and you always need to add the tool manually to the PATH (with Add-Content -Path $env:CM_ENV...)

[eseidel]

I don't know 🤷 Suggestions welcome, we're happy to change our powershell script in any way necessary!
https://github.com/shorebirdtech/install/blob/main/install.ps1

[mohammedbabelly20]

Hey @nilsreichardt,

• The issue is not how to add the PATH, it's already there.
• It can be fixed from our side if we updated our machines to Win Server 2022, which is something we're not planning to do at the time. If I or someone from Shorebird find out why this issue is happening on Win Server 2019 default PowerShell then we can suggest that fix.

For now, how to use Shorebird on Codemagic's Windows machine?
It's a simple trick that you can do to run the PS1 file directly by defining an environment variable with the file's full path, then using the variable name like this & $env:shorebird --version instead of shorebird --version.

  shorebird-windows-workflow:
    name: Shorebird widows Workflow
    instance_type: windows_x2
    environment:
      flutter: stable    
      vars:
        shorebird: "C:\\Users\\builder\\.shorebird\\bin\\shorebird.ps1"
    scripts:
      - name: Setup Shorebird
        script: |
          Set-ExecutionPolicy RemoteSigned -scope CurrentUser # Needed to execute remote scripts
          iwr 'https://raw.githubusercontent.com/shorebirdtech/install/main/install.ps1'|iex

      - name: Shorebird Patch
        script: |
          & $env:shorebird --version

I'm gonna leave this discussion open for now.

[nilsreichardt]

Cool, thanks for the workaround 👍 I think this should be enough for the beginning. To be honest, I doubt that not much people will use Windows machines to build the Android/iOS apps (most will use macOS/Linux). It's just nice to have a complete documentation for all machines.

[rafeysup93]

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