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[impellerc] Crash on Windows when paths contain non-ASCII characters #190233

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@bkonyi

The Impeller shader compiler (impellerc) crashes (exit code 3) on Windows when include paths contain non-ASCII (Unicode) characters.
This happens because the C++ command line parser in engine/src/flutter/impeller/compiler/switches.cc converts path strings using narrow ANSI strings instead of UTF-8, which then fails inside fml::Utf8ToWideString.

Additionally, flutter_tools hides impellerc's stdout and stderr during ShaderCompilerException, making this hard to debug.
We need to:

  1. Fix the path conversion in switches.cc to use Utf8FromPath.
  2. Improve ShaderCompilerException diagnostics to capture and print stdout/stderr.
  3. Add helpful hints in the tool for aborted compilations and Unicode path warnings.

Note: This issue was identified as a top-10 crasher in the Flutter stable release version 3.44.8.

Activity

  1. added
    P2Important issues not at the top of the work list
    team-toolOwned by Flutter Tool team
    triaged-toolTriaged by Flutter Tool team
    on Jul 29, 2026
  2. self-assigned this
    on Jul 29, 2026
  3. added a commit that references this issue on Aug 4, 2026
  4. added a commit that references this issue on Aug 5, 2026
    dcb306f
  5. github-actions commented on Aug 19, 2026

    @github-actions

    This thread has been automatically locked since there has not been any recent activity after it was closed. If you are still experiencing a similar issue, please open a new bug, including the output of flutter doctor -v and a minimal reproduction of the issue.

  6. locked as resolved and limited conversation to collaborators on Aug 19, 2026
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P2Important issues not at the top of the work listteam-toolOwned by Flutter Tool teamtriaged-toolTriaged by Flutter Tool team

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