`bazel test` fails on Windows with error 206 when the runfiles path exceeds MAX_PATH

[rdesgroppes]

Description of the bug:

On Windows, bazel test fails for any test run through the native Windows test wrapper (tw.exe, the default per --incompatible_windows_native_test_wrapper) whose runfiles directory path exceeds MAX_PATH (260 characters).
This is easy to hit with long, tag-qualified or config-transition-suffixed target names combined with a deeply nested bazel-out/<platform>-<config-hash>/bin/... output tree.
The wrapper is generic Bazel test-execution machinery, so this applies regardless of the test rule (e.g., go_test):

ERROR(tools/test/windows/tw.cc:488) value: 206 (0x000000ce), arg: C:\...\<target>.exe.runfiles\_main: Could not chdir

Windows error 206 is ERROR_FILENAME_EXCED_RANGE, from ChdirToRunfiles's call to SetCurrentDirectoryW in tools/test/windows/tw.cc.

Envisioned fix direction: Windows 10 1607+'s longPathAware-manifest opt-in.

Which category does this issue belong to?

Local Execution

What's the simplest, easiest way to reproduce this bug? Please provide a minimal example if possible.

Any Windows bazel test invocation whose runfiles directory path exceeds 260 characters reproduces this.

For example, a cc_test target with a long enough name that <output_base>/execroot/<repo>/bazel-out/<platform>/bin/<pkg>/<name>.exe.runfiles/<workspace> exceeds 260 characters.

Which operating system are you running Bazel on?

Windows

What is the output of bazel info release?

release 9.2.0

If bazel info release returns development version or (@non-git), tell us how you built Bazel.

No response

What's the output of git remote get-url origin; git rev-parse HEAD ?

If this is a regression, please try to identify the Bazel commit where the bug was introduced with bazelisk --bisect.

Not believed to be a regression: ChdirToRunfiles's use of SetCurrentDirectoryW without long-path handling appears to predate any version we've checked and is unrelated to any specific recent change.

Have you found anything relevant by searching the web?

• https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/fileio/maximum-file-path-limitation
• SetCurrentDirectory MAX_PATH MicrosoftDocs/feedback#1441 (SetCurrentDirectory failing on paths over MAX_PATH with error 206, even with the \\?\ prefix, reproduced on Windows Server 2008/2012/2016/2019)
• Fix launching executables whose path can't be shortened on Windows #29921 (the related but different CreateProcessW/lpApplicationName fix that does not cover this code path)
• Runfiles cannot open MANIFEST files on paths longer than 260 chars #11362 and the abandoned Allow reading of MANIFEST file over MAX_PATH #11364: a separate, independent MAX_PATH bug in rules_cc's Runfiles::Create that can also affect Windows test execution
• Windows: support long paths when calling WinAPI functions #2181 (the original, long-closed tracking issue for Windows long-path support generally)
• bazel run before bazel test fails with Could not chdir on Windows #10621 and Cannot run sh_test tests on Windows [#6622 will fix it] #7387 share the "Could not chdir" error text from the same ChdirToRunfiles call site, but are a different bug (a missing runfiles directory from bazel run/bazel test ordering, error code 2/ERROR_FILE_NOT_FOUND, not MAX_PATH/error 206)

Any other information, logs, or outputs that you want to share?

Fix in progress.