wp_normalize_path() breaks path_is_absolute() in Windows.

[paultgoodchild]

Apologies in advance if this is considered correct behaviour, but it's strange that this is the case.

On Windows, when you take an absolute file system path and use wp_normalize_path() and then pass this result to path_is_absolute(), you get false instead of true.

Super simple demo:

<?php
var_dump( path_is_absolute( __FILE__ ) );
var_dump( path_is_absolute( wp_normalize_path( __FILE__ ) ) );

*nix Result:

bool(true)
bool(true)

Windows Result:

bool(true)
bool(false)

[paultgoodchild]

A potential fix for this is to adjust the regex in the function, so instead of:

preg_match( '#^[a-zA-Z]:\\\\#', $path )

you could have

preg_match( '#^[a-zA-Z]:(\\\\|/)#', $path )

[paultgoodchild]

a git diff to fix the problem

[jrf]

Had a quick look at the patch.
Suggestion: look into using the PHP constant DIRECTORY_SEPARATOR.

[itowhid06]

updated patch using DIRECTORY_SEPARATOR

[itowhid06]

Uploaded an updated patch with suggestion of @jrf. Works for me.

[jrf]

@itowhid06 Your patch doesn't address the problem as it only checks for the separator, but no longer checks whether something is an absolute path starting with C: (as in drive letter).

[itowhid06]

updated the regex

[paultgoodchild]

I'd need to take a much closer look at the diffs, but how does such a complex IF solve this, unless I'm missing something.

I know the DIRECTORY SEPARATOR constant certainly cannot fix this problem, because of the way normalize works.

[paultgoodchild]

This ticket has the risk of being waylaid as no-one has looked at it in a while.

The suggestions around the use of DIRECTORY_SEPARATOR don't work as they don't understand the underlying problem. It's got nothing to do with DIRECTORY_SEPARATOR because the the issue stems from the use of wp_normalize_path() function, which has nothing to do with DIRECTORY_SEPARATOR.

I believe my original patch solves this problem and is simple, effective and doesn't affect any of the other processing in the problem-function.

Would be good if someone could take a deeper look at this and verify the simple patch either way.
Thanks!

[apedog]

Function path_is_absolute() should handle paths with mixed slashes when installed on Windows.
PHP constant DIRECTORY_SEPARATOR is not relevant to this issue.

[audrasjb]

Hi,

Looks like the patch still needs unit tests.
With 5.4 Beta 3 approaching and the Beta period reserved for bugs introduced during the cycle, this is being moved to Future Release. If any maintainer or committer feels this should be included or wishes to assume ownership during a specific cycle, feel free to update the milestone accordingly.

[nlpro]

Perhaps the description of the path_is_absolute() function as provided in the Code Reference on developer.wordpress.org:

Test if a given filesystem path is absolute.

should be changed to something like:

Test if a given (non normalized) filesystem path is absolute.

It seems WordPress Core distinguishes between functional (as is) paths and (normalized) display/comparable paths.