`--build-sea` NodeJS 25.5.0: `Error: Couldn't stat executable node` Windows, Command Prompt

[alexsch01]

I was looking at #61167 since it looked really cool

---

sea-config.json

{ "main": "hello.js", "output": "sea.exe" }

hello.js

console.log("Hello")

---

NodeJS 25.5.0, Windows, Command Prompt

>node --build-sea sea-config.json
Error: Couldn't stat executable node

---

Same command as above works in Windows PowerShell and Git Bash

[joyeecheung]

hmm, in retrospect we should've put the libuv error code in there to give more information. Though I suspect the particular failure reported here is likely environment-dependent e.g. permission issues.

[alexsch01]

Wait, if I hardcode the full path to node.exe in the "executable" field of sea-config.json, it works!

I think it's an issue of detecting the path on Command Prompt

[joyeecheung]

I suspect that it might have to do with the fact that currently the configuration treats relative paths as "relative to current working directory", while intuitively users might think it should be "relative to the configuration file's path". I am inclined to change it to the latter, though it's a bit breaking and might warrant semver major.

[alexsch01]

it must be this

node/src/node_sea_bin.cc

Lines 390 to 392 in 8e41b8d

	if (config.executable_path.empty()) {
	config.executable_path = args[0];
	}

[joyeecheung]

I see, it might be because in certain shell environments (or depending on how you alias node in your shell), argv[0] is not expanded into the full path of the original executable. We can probably reuse the exec_path computation logic to compute it in that case.