[addisonj]

I am somewhat surprised at this topic. Of all the the issues Node.js has on windows, this seems like a fairly minor one. In my eyes, the biggest issue is simply this:

A lot of module writers don't care about Windows.

A big part of the node ecosystem is that there is a module for practically anything. While node core has great support for windows, and also helps aid developers in writing code that is windows compatible, from what I have seen, its not often followed.

Any number of simple things break modules on windows, using a '/' as a path separator instead of path.join, native modules, bash or shell scripts used in pre- or post-install scripts and probably a hundred other small ways to screw it up. Even trying to make your own module Windows compatible is often thwarted by a dependency that doesn't. Like Java's promise of "Write once, run anywhere", its a great idea, but hasn't completely panned out.

I really hope that as the node community matures, there can be more of a focus on making sure things work on Windows. Node is a great platform partially because of all those modules and getting them all working will make writing cross platform apps and services a heck of a lot easier.

[brokenparser]

Windows actually supports using / as a path delimiter. If a program is (following the robustness principle) liberal in what it accepts (both / and \\) and strict in what it sends (just /), it'll work (barring any other issues).