GitHub Actions logs for PowerShell builds are difficult to navigate due to verbose, flat output. This wraps major build operations with Write-LogGroupStart/Write-LogGroupEnd to create collapsible sections.

Changes

Modified Functions:

• Start-PSBuild: Grouped restore, build, module restore, and config generation
• Start-PSBootstrap: Grouped native dependencies, .NET SDK, Windows dependencies, and global tools installation
• Install-Dotnet: Wrapped entire SDK installation
• Show-Environment (new): Created function in tools/ci.psm1 to display environment variables in a log group

Documentation Added:

• Created .github/instructions/log-grouping-guidelines.instructions.md with best practices for using log groups:
  • Groups cannot be nested
  • Groups should contain substantial output (5+ lines)
  • Each group should represent an independent operation
  • Avoid groups in loops or for small operations

Workflow Fixes:

• Replaced all instances of Get-ChildItem -Path env: | Out-String -width 9999 -Stream | write-Verbose -Verbose with Show-Environment function call (6 locations in workflows and actions)
• Added buildModuleChanged to outputs in linux-ci.yml, windows-ci.yml, and macos-ci.yml
• Updated all build and test job conditions to include buildModuleChanged == 'true' so builds and tests are triggered when build.psm1 is modified

Guidelines Applied

Based on review feedback, the implementation follows these principles:

• No Nesting: Groups are not nested to comply with GitHub Actions limitations
• Substantial Content: Only operations with meaningful output are grouped (small operations like ResGen/TypeGen use simple logging)
• Independent Operations: Each group represents a logically independent build phase

Example

Before:

Run dotnet restore /src/powershell-unix ...
Done restoring /src/powershell-unix
Run dotnet restore /src/TypeCatalogGen ...
Done restoring /src/TypeCatalogGen
Run dotnet publish --configuration Release
PowerShell output: /path/to/publish/pwsh

After:

::group::Restore NuGet Packages
Run dotnet restore /src/powershell-unix ...
Done restoring /src/powershell-unix
Run dotnet restore /src/TypeCatalogGen ...
Done restoring /src/TypeCatalogGen
::endgroup::
::group::Build PowerShell
Run dotnet publish --configuration Release
PowerShell output: /path/to/publish/pwsh
::endgroup::

Renders as collapsible sections in GitHub Actions UI.

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