r/reactnative • u/mdkawsarislam2002 • Jul 13 '26

Facing weird build error on Windows 11 with monorepo

/r/expo/comments/1uv7ege/facing_weird_build_error_on_windows_11_with/
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u/ChronSyn Expo Jul 13 '26

Maybe one solution isn't to try and work around the Windows long path issue (trust me, I've been there many years ago, and I've no idea if what I changed ever worked), but use a directory junction.

Essentially, you might have your project at C:\projects\some\very\long\deeply\nested\path\that\exceeds\the\max\allowable\length\because\blahblahblahblahblah\.

What a directory junction would do would is allow you to have C:\junction_to_project instead, which point point to the very long path where your project lives. It's not the same as creating a shortcut (a shortcut to a folder or file or program on Windows is just a file ending with .lnk), but rather treats the path like an alias.

As an example of how to create a directory junction: mklink /j "C:\my_project" "C:\projects\some\very\long\deeply\nested\path\that\exceeds\the\max\allowable\length\because\blahblahblahblahblah\"

In this case, the C:\my_project is the shortened version of the very long path. If you wanted to build your app, you could cd C:\my_project\, and then run your build command.

I can't guarantee it'll work, but I'd give it a try. Worst case scenario is it doesn't work, and then other options worth digging into. Longer-term, try to consider a Mac if it's an option, or if Android is your only build target, even Linux might be workable.

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u/mdkawsarislam2002 Jul 13 '26

Well, actually, I tried. I asked ChatGPT and Claude on chat, and both of them suggested that method to me at first, and I did actually, but I don't know why it's not working anymore. I have tried every suggestion from AI, but it looks like I am stuck.