Add a GHA Windows test workflow?

[jsumners]

When pull requests are opened/updated in this repo the following workflows are automatically run:

• https://github.com/nodejs/node/blob/6557c1c9b1206a85bb7d8e7450e8c3a4cff7c84b/.github/workflows/test-linux.yml
• https://github.com/nodejs/node/blob/6557c1c9b1206a85bb7d8e7450e8c3a4cff7c84b/.github/workflows/test-macos.yml

But there isn't a corresponding Windows workflow. This is causing a bit of headache for at least me in PR https://github.com/nodejs/node/pull/48740. I don't have a Windows system to test on, but the PR needs to pass on Windows. The only way to get the PR to get run against a Windows system is for someone with privileges to add the needs-ci tag to the PR, and then it takes someone familiar with Jenkins, or at least the org's Jenkins setup, to find what the error is.

Given all of that, why isn't there a GitHub Actions workflow that runs the tests on Windows?

[richardlau]

Given all of that, why isn't there a GitHub Actions workflow that runs the tests on Windows?

Nobody has volunteered to implement one (i.e. no follow up to https://github.com/nodejs/node/pull/32450#discussion_r398268131).

[jsumners]

🙁

Is there no one with Windows knowledge on the core team that could add it?

[bnoordhuis]

"Vested interest" is probably a better choice of words than "knowledge."

I suspect the vast majority of regular contributors run Linux or macOS, not Windows. If you want to see it happen, send a pull request.

[jsumners]

I have zero knowledge of building this thing in Windows. My only interest is in seeing validation on PRs without the overhead outlined above.

[H4ad]

I have a Windows machine, I can help with that, I just need some direction on it, if you can add some issues/docs about how is working today, I can start from that, otherwise, I will try dig into the current GHA to see how it works.

Also, do we have resources to run on Windows? I mean, I don't know if we use Runners from Github or if we run on our infrastructure.

[richardlau]

@H4ad We have our own infrastructure but that's only used for the Jenkins CI. For anything running on GitHub actions we use the standard runners.

[jsumners]

Thank you @H4ad.

[targos]

You could start with a copy of https://github.com/nodejs/node/blob/main/.github/workflows/coverage-windows.yml

[richardlau]

Also https://github.com/nodejs/node/blob/main/.github/workflows/build-windows.yml. Ideally replace this with a test-windows workflow.

[H4ad]

Just for education purposes, what makes the CI run except for the on property? I ask this because I thought the coverage-windows should run by default on PRs but is not the case.

[targos]

coverage-windows doesn't run because it is currently disabled: https://github.com/nodejs/node/issues/50049

[bcoe]

Edit: @targos @richardlau just noting that as of the time of this comment Coverage Windows is disabled manually again:

[richardlau]

@bcoe Building on Windows with the latest Visual Studio (i.e. the one in the GitHub Action runners) is broken due to a compiler bug.

Refs: https://github.com/nodejs/build/issues/3739 Refs: https://github.com/nodejs/node/pull/53863