Fix Windows test steps that never ran and the Windows conda cache path

[antonwolfy]

The Windows test jobs in conda-package.yml and conda-package-cf.yml have not been running any tests: the smoke test and pytest steps are skipped, and the steps still pass. The Windows conda package cache was never saved either. Both problems already exist on main, and a run from 2026-08-07 already shows the skipped steps.

Why the tests did not run

The test_windows steps run with shell: cmd /C CALL {0}, and the script calls conda activate ... without CALL. On Windows conda is a batch file (conda.bat), and running a batch file from another one without CALL never returns. So every command after the first conda call in the step is skipped:

• Smoke test — python -c "import mkl_umath ..." never runs
• Run tests — python -m pytest -v -s --pyargs mkl_umath never runs
• Report content of test environment — the echo lines and conda info && conda list never run

The logs show it: the step echoes D:\a\mkl_umath\mkl_umath>conda activate test_mkl_umath and nothing after it, and there is no pytest output on Windows, while the Linux test jobs report 392 passed, 1 skipped.

Changes

In both workflows (test_windows only):

• Prefix the conda calls in the three steps above with CALL. python / python -m pytest is now the last command of its step, so a failure fails the job.
• Point the build_windows and test_windows cache steps at ~/conda_pkgs_dir, setup-miniconda's package directory (the logs show packages in C:\Users\runneradmin\conda_pkgs_dir), instead of /home/runner/conda_pkgs_dir, which does not exist on Windows runners. Every Windows job currently logs "Path Validation Error" and "Cache not found".

The conda activate calls in build_windows are unchanged: those steps run under the default pwsh shell, where conda activate is a PowerShell function and returns normally.

Notes

• This is the first time in a while that the Windows tests actually run, so it may surface Windows test failures that were hidden until now.
• setup-miniconda's README recommends use-only-tar-bz2: true for caching. It is not set here because most conda-forge packages are now published only as .conda; the Linux jobs already cache ~/.conda/pkgs without it.

[jharlow-intel]

Thanks, great catch! The commit message explains the batch-file CALL trap clearly, and the Windows job logs now show pytest actually running (392 passed) and the conda cache being saved, where main skipped both silently.