Cygwin installations directly on root drive

["Dr. Volker Zell" <vzell at volkerzell dot de>]

Hi

I always installed my Cygwin environment on the root of a dedicated 
drive (for example D:)
instead of the Setup.exe suggested subdirectory (for example D:\cygwin)

I recently upgraded my Cygwin system from cygwin1.dll (version 3.0.9) to 
the latest 3.1.2-1 package.

Now whenever I call an executable linked with this dll I get the 
following stack trace:

[04:38]D:\>Cygwin.bat
      0 [main] bash (5368) D:\bin\bash.exe: *** fatal error - add_item 
("\??\D:", "/", ...) failed, errno 22
Stack trace:
Frame        Function    Args
000FFFFABCC  001800614DE (0018028087A, 0018025A1B9, 00800010000, 
000FFFF8B40)
000FFFFABCC  00180049249 (000FFFF9BC0, 000FFFFABCC, 00000000000, 
00000000000)
000FFFFABCC  00180049282 (000FFFF9BC0, 00000000016, 00800010000, 
3A445C3F3F5C)
000FFFFABCC  001800E23DC (000FFFFCBC0, 000FFFFCE00, 001800D2F78, 
00000000000)
000FFFFCCD0  00180132725 (001800CB15C, 00000000000, 00000000000, 
00000000000)
000FFFFCCD0  00180049873 (00000000000, 00000000000, 00000000000, 
00000000000)
00000000000  00180048353 (00000000000, 00000000000, 00000000000, 
00000000000)
000FFFFFFF0  00180048404 (00000000000, 00000000000, 00000000000, 
00000000000)
End of stack trace

[04:42]D:\>pwd
      0 [main] pwd (3192) D:\bin\pwd.exe: *** fatal error - add_item 
("\??\D:", "/", ...) failed, errno 22
Stack trace:
Frame        Function    Args
000FFFFABCC  001800614DE (0018028087A, 0018025A1B9, 00800010000, 
000FFFF8B40)
000FFFFABCC  00180049249 (000FFFF9BC0, 000FFFFABCC, 00000000000, 
00000000000)
000FFFFABCC  00180049282 (000FFFF9BC0, 00000000016, 00800010000, 
3A445C3F3F5C)
000FFFFABCC  001800E23DC (000FFFFCBC0, 000FFFFCE00, 001800D2F78, 
00000000000)
000FFFFCCD0  00180132725 (001800CB15C, 00000000000, 00000000000, 
00000000000)
000FFFFCCD0  00180049873 (00000000000, 00000000000, 00000000000, 
00000000000)
00000000000  00180048353 (00000000000, 00000000000, 00000000000, 
00000000000)
000FFFFFFF0  00180048404 (00000000000, 00000000000, 00000000000, 
00000000000)
End of stack trace


The only mention of "\\??\\D:" seems to come from the 
""HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Cygwin\Installations"
registry entry (see below)

I then tried new base installations under "D:\cygwin", "C:\" and 
"C:\cygwin":

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Cygwin\Installations]
"8aa36a1fe80b21a1"="\\??\\D:" <=== Broken
"c5e39b7a9d22bafb"="\\??\\C:\\cygwin" <=== OK
"1720b01b097bf4fc"="\\??\\D:\\cygwin" <=== OK
"2af6b8d6450bff37"="\\??\\C:" <=== Broken

It looks like installations directly to the root of a drive DO NOT work 
anymore, although the Cygwin
installer still allows it (with a warning).

This all seems to be related to a patch mentioned in 
https://cygwin.com/ml/cygwin/2019-09/msg00255.html


My big problem is: ALL of my Cygwin installations on different systems 
now will break
during upgrade because of the initial Root-Drive install. Also the rest 
of my ecosystem
assumes this Root-Drive install and its a nightmare to fix.

Any chance this type of installation can be supported again?

I found a mention of Ken Brown "I think I see how to fix this.  I'll 
submit a patch within the next few days."
in https://cygwin.com/ml/cygwin/2020-01/msg00129.html

Thanks
  Volker


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