On Windows machines using Rails 6 or 7 (tested both) you can not run rails credentials:edit if the Windows username has a space in it.

[Milella]

I have been trying to figure out why on my home machine I have been unable to run rails credentials:edit no matter WHAT editor I choose it simply would NOT work. Had this problem for a good year or so. It would pull up a blank file or sometimes 2 files in some editors, but never would it EVER decrypt the rails credentials. I discovered this when I was trying to troubleshoot an app using the production mode on my home development machine. It told me it couldn't find the SECRET_KEY_BASE. This is because it is in the encrypted credentials file and it can't decrypt it. So I had to add it to my yaml file which I have had to use on my home dev machine to handle the ENV variables BECAUSE rails credentials:edit has never worked.

My work machine I login using scottm (my company username). On my home machine I sign in using Scott Milella (my real name).

When I first ran into this I tried EVERYTHING on my home machine to fix this but nothing I did worked.
SO I reloaded my machine from scratch and to my surprise the very same problem exists.
I re-setup my entire setup with the same username Scott Milella and the same thing happened despite everything being fresh.

So I then tried on another machine which is my laptop. I again setup my account using Scott Milella.
On this laptop I had installed a fresh load of Windows 10 22H2, VSCODE latest, install NodeJS v16.18.1 (the v Heroku uses), SQLite3 (Latest), GIT( Latest), installed Ruby 3.2.0 (also tried 2.7.7 and 3.1), and then gem install rails -v 6.1.7.3. Same problem existed.
To rule out if this was a bug in just v6.1 of Rails I then installed Rails 7 just to be thorough and it does the very same thing.
So on my laptop I create a new account called stech. I then logged in and went to the terminal, spun up a new rails app and to my complete surprise it decrypted the credentials! All the very same software just an account name without a space.

SO on my home PC I did the same thing, I created a new account, didn't configure anything. Just launched Windows Terminal again (using Git Bash). went to my app I previously couldn't decrypt and to my complete surprise and ANNOYANCE it worked!

I also can not run the rails credentials:edit command in Windows Command Prompt or Powershell.
There is something you are doing in your rails credentials:edit that is not passing the information correctly WHEN there is a space in the username.
I tried everything with regards to using quotes on paths and anything and everything I could think of and I can find no way to defeat this bug in Rails with regards to the rails credentials:edit command.

This is the ONLY THING I have ran into on a Windows machine using Rails v6 and Ruby 2.7.7 or higher I have ran into that I can not seem to overcome (with a space in the username that is).

If you look at the way it is constructing the path when I login with Scott Milella it is somehow passing the path as:
"C:\Users\SCOTTM\~1\AppData\Local\Temp\4384.credentials.yml"
So if you look at that path it should be Users\Scott Milella but instead it is changing my name to all UPPERCASE and somehow it is also truncating it to just SCOTTM and then it is adding a "\~1\" as a separate folder. I understand windows can modify the path and add a ~1 to the end of something but in this case it isn't doing that, it is adding a complete new folder with \~1\ . SO when it hits that space it is incorrectly pathing the file. The folder it is talking about doesn't even exist.

I have been trying to figure this out off and on for a good year or so and now I have PROVEN it is a Rails bug
.
It isn't a bash problem because it has no other issues of ANY KIND with Bash, Rails, Windows Terminal anything. Everything works PROPER except the rails credentials:edit

I have attached a picture of it not working when I login with Scott Milella.

Here is a picture showing that it DOES work when I login with stech.

By the way rails incorrectly creates that weird pathname with the ~1\ on both my LAPTOP and my DESKTOP, the very SAME PATH if I login on both machines as Scott Milella. This is why I never ran into the problem on my work DEV Machine because I have our company on a domain and at work my login name is the scottm instead of Scott Milella.

If you need any further information please let me know.
I would LOVE to know how to solve this without having to redo my Windows machine AGAIN to just remove a space from a Username.

Thank You,
Scott Milella

[Milella]

I would assume this bug goes back to Rails v5.2

[guilleiguaran]

@Milella just out of curiosity, have you tested this with Rails main branch (7.1)?

I'm trying to see if this version would be in the scope of the fix as well or if this applies only for current versions.

[Milella]

Hello @guilleiguaran,
Thank you for the reply.
I have not tried v7.1 but I will test that out ASAP and let you know if the same issue occurs.

As another troubleshooting step for this issue I went ahead and renamed my Windows Account on my Home DEV machine to ScottM to match my work machine and made all of the other changes so that my profile folder was also ScottM etc.
Took me a better part of my Saturday to get my account renamed and make the tons of changes in Windows and OneDrive and so many different things. I had forgotten how much work it really is to rename a user account on Modern Windows.

After I rebooted from renaming and re-configuring Windows for the change of my account name the Rails credentials:edit command all of a sudden worked with EVERYTHING, Notepad, Sublime, VSCode, Notepad++ all of which did not work when I had the space in it.

Again I will test with Rails 7.1 ASAP and I will update this issue.

Thank you again for the reply!

Scott

[ghiculescu]

It looks like #44910 should fix this. That fix will be included in Rails 7.1.

[guilleiguaran]

@Milella I can backport the fix to 7.0, other previous versions are unsupported due to our maintenance policy, is this ok for you?

[Milella]

The fix only being applied to 7.0+ would be up to you guys. I already fixed my own issue. I wasn't just reporting it for my own issue I was reporting it to better the Ruby/Rails community. I am surprised I am the first one to run into this (or the first one who ran into this and reported it).

I would love to see it fixed all the way back to Rails 5.2 (assuming the bug goes back to that v when the enc credentials came out) but if you guys can't do that then certainly v7 and up as a minimum.

If you could even tell me how to monkey patch the fix into the older apps that would really help!
I really did try EVERYTHING to get around that issue using " ' ' " combinations and () and everything in between.

Also if we could get the documentation updated so that it can warn someone?
That way someone else doesn't have to spend days and days troubleshooting the issue like I did.

I would even be willing to make the doc updates if someone could give me some brief instructions on how to do it and where in the docs it would be appropriate. ANYTHING I can do to help with this issue I am MORE than willing to do.

In fact, if you guys ever need help testing something on Windows let me know because I am a 100% Windows Rail dev. NOT WSL Strait Windows.

Thank you all for your time on this matter!
Scott

[guilleiguaran]

I've backported the fix to 7-0-stable: 30a287a and the fix will be included in both 7.1.0 and 7.0.6