Translating PSDrive-based path arguments for external (native) executables is overzealous (PSNativePSPathResolution)

PR #12386 introduced experimental feature PSNativePSPathResolution, which as of (at least) PowerShell Core 7.1.0-preview.7 has become a default feature.

For problems with this feature in general, see Bypassing translation of PSDrive-based path arguments for external (native) executables is obscure and inadequate (PSNativePSPathResolution) #13644

Its purpose is to translate PowerShell-drive-based paths to native filesystem paths, because external executables only understand the latter.

This translation is currently overzealous in that it nonsensically translates an argument that starts with : (which clearly isn't a drive-based path).

@DHowett has pinpointed the problematic behavior to:

PowerShell/src/System.Management.Automation/engine/NativeCommandParameterBinder.cs

Lines 388 to 406 in 3effa20

    
           if (path.Contains(':')) 
        
           { 
        
               LocationGlobber globber = new LocationGlobber(context.SessionState); 
        
               try 
        
               { 
        
                   ProviderInfo providerInfo; 
        
                   // replace the argument with resolved path if it's a filesystem path 
        
                   string pspath = globber.GetProviderPath(path, out providerInfo); 
        
                   if (string.Equals(providerInfo.Name, FileSystemProvider.ProviderName, StringComparison.OrdinalIgnoreCase)) 
        
                   { 
        
                       path = pspath; 
        
                   } 
        
               } 
        
               catch 
        
               { 
        
                   // if it's not a provider path, do nothing 
        
               } 
        
           }

Steps to reproduce

On Unix:

/bin/echo :foo | Should -Be ':foo'

On Windows:

cmd /c echo :foo | Should -Be ':foo'

Expected behavior

The test should succeed.

Actual behavior

The test fails, because the the current location's path is unexpectedly prepended to :

Expected strings to be the same, but they were different. Expected length: 4 Actual length:   44 Strings differ at index 0.
Expected: ':foo' But was:  '/Users/jdoe...'

Environment data

PowerShell Core 7.1.0-preview.7

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Translating PSDrive-based path arguments for external (native) executables is overzealous (PSNativePSPathResolution) #13640

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	if (path.Contains(':'))
	{
	LocationGlobber globber = new LocationGlobber(context.SessionState);
	try
	{
	ProviderInfo providerInfo;

	// replace the argument with resolved path if it's a filesystem path
	string pspath = globber.GetProviderPath(path, out providerInfo);
	if (string.Equals(providerInfo.Name, FileSystemProvider.ProviderName, StringComparison.OrdinalIgnoreCase))
	{
	path = pspath;
	}
	}
	catch
	{
	// if it's not a provider path, do nothing
	}
	}

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Translating PSDrive-based path arguments for external (native) executables is overzealous (PSNativePSPathResolution) #13640

Description

Steps to reproduce

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