[BUG] EACCES Error with Windows 11 App Execution Aliases

[gdavidkov]

Is there an existing issue for this?

• [x] I have searched the existing issues

Current Behavior

The node-which module (and its dependency isexe) encounters EACCES: permission denied errors when checking Windows 11 App Execution Aliases like mspaint.exe located in %LOCALAPPDATA%\Microsoft\WindowsApps\.

Error: EACCES: permission denied, stat 'C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\Microsoft\WindowsApps\mspaint.exe'
    at statSync (node:fs:1740:25)
    at t.statSync (node:electron/js2c/node_init:2:5407)

Windows 11 App Execution Aliases are special files that:

1. Appear as regular .exe files in directory listings
2. Can be executed normally from command line
3. Cannot be accessed with fs.stat() or fs.statSync() - these operations throw EACCES errors
4. Can be checked for existence using fs.access()

• The which module correctly returns null when using { nothrow: true }
• The isexe module correctly returns false when using { ignoreErrors: true }
• Direct fs.statSync() calls fail with EACCES
• fs.accessSync() works correctly on the same files

Expected Behavior

Since mspaint.exe is a valid executable in the user's PATH that can be launched successfully, the expected behavior should be:

• which.sync('mspaint') should return the path to the executable: C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\Microsoft\WindowsApps\mspaint.exe
• isexe.sync(mspaintPath) should return true (indicating the file is executable)
• App Execution Aliases should be treated as valid executables since they:
  • Have executable file extensions (.exe)
  • Are included in the system PATH
  • Can be launched successfully from command line
  • Are legitimate Windows applications

Steps To Reproduce

• Windows 11 system
• Node.js installed
• which module installed (npm install which)
• MS Paint available as App Execution Alias (default on Windows 11)

const which = require('which');
const result = which.sync('mspaint');
console.log('Found mspaint at:', result);

Environment

• npm: 11.4.2
• Node: 22.15.0
• OS: Windows 11
• platform: Win32

The PR: https://github.com/isaacs/isexe/pull/40