fix(cli): call defaultRegistryDirectory() when resolving the cache file

[Mert Can Altin (mertcanaltin)]

I am interested in the playwright-cli version command because this version control code worked once one day and set a note for update control, but this control does not write the version to the document and always goes to control

I called the defaultRegistryDirectory() method after starting the writer for the doc, and it didn’t go to the web for version control; it read the cache doc.

What is broken

The update check is meant to run at most once a day, cached in cli-update-check.json. That cache file is never written, so every CLI invocation hits registry.npmjs.org and re-runs the installed-skill check.

Root cause

registry.defaultRegistryDirectory became a function in microsoft/playwright#41942 (2026-07-23) and reached this repo with the roll to 1.63.0-alpha-2026-08-05 (#442). cacheFile() still used it as a string:

const dir = process.env.PLAYWRIGHT_CLI_INSTALLATION_FOR_TEST || registry.defaultRegistryDirectory;
return path.join(dir, 'cli-update-check.json');

path.join() throws a TypeError, which readCache() and writeCache() swallow in their bare catch {} — so the failure reads as "no cache yet" and the check is always stale.

Impact

Measured with --version, before → after:

network	before	after
normal	~480ms	~125ms
firewall that drops packets to npm	~1650ms	~125ms

The second row is the 1500ms AbortController timeout in fetchLatestVersion(), paid on every command.

Why CI did not catch it

runCli() always sets PLAYWRIGHT_CLI_INSTALLATION_FOR_TEST, so the || short-circuits and the broken branch never runs. The added test points HOME at a temp directory, leaves that variable empty, and asserts the cache file is written.

Changes

• call registry.defaultRegistryDirectory()
• regression test covering the default cache path
• hoist cacheFile() out of the try blocks so only I/O and parse errors are swallowed there, instead of masking a path-computation bug as "no cache" (happy to drop this if you prefer the fix alone)

asist: Claude opus 5

[Mert Can Altin (mertcanaltin)]

and command if using cache fast to ~370ms all command.

[Mert Can Altin (mertcanaltin)]

@microsoft-github-policy-service agree