should address #2732, but I'm concerned about my inability to test on windows

i am still very concerned that I can't test this on windows - I'm not used to developing for windows, so not sure that these links will work, even if the test passes.

is there a good AWS AMI to use for windows testing? i can run this in my own AWS account, and would be happy to do that before merging (I'll have some time on Thursday Jan 17th for that, if someone can recommend an AMI).