[winml catalog] Documented ov alias is rejected

Look at the CLI help text generation and the argument parser for the catalog command, likely in a file like winml/cli/catalog.py. Find where the --ep argument is defined and its accepted aliases. Compare the help text to the validation logic. The fix is to either add 'ov' to the accepted values or remove it from the help. Test by running the provided reproduction commands.

Summary

Help advertises ov alias, but catalog rejects it

Priority: P1, confirmed by the release driver on 2026-09-23.
Bugbash reference: 2026-09-22 / BUG-005.
Status: Observed in the first test round; no fix or post-fix regression is recorded. This issue is based on retained test evidence, not a new test run.

Environment

• Test date: 2026-09-22; findings triaged on 2026-09-23.
• CLI: winml-cli 0.4.0, installed from a local wheel. The exact source commit/build provenance is not recorded in the test evidence.
• Hardware: Snapdragon X Elite X1E80100, Qualcomm Hexagon NPU.
• OS: Windows 11 26H1, build 28000.2956, ARM64.
• Python: 3.11.15, workspace virtual environment.
• EP: QNNExecutionProvider from WinML Catalog, package 2.2480.49.0.
• ONNX Runtime: 1.27.1.202607110137, Windows ML distribution.
• ONNX: 1.18.0; PyTorch: 2.14.0; Transformers: 4.57.6.
• Model: catalog microsoft/resnet-50, image-classification, pixel_values FP32 [1, 3, 224, 224].
• Quantization, where applicable: w8a16, uint8 weights / uint16 activations, 10 calibration samples.

Reproduction

Run in PowerShell with winml-cli 0.4.0 installed:

uv run winml catalog --help
uv run winml catalog --ep ov --format json
uv run winml catalog --ep openvino --format json

The retained catalog help advertises ov as an EP alias.

Expected result

A documented alias is accepted, or the unsupported alias is removed from help.

Actual result

catalog --ep ov --format json exits with code 2 and an Invalid value parameter-validation error. catalog --ep openvino --format json exits with code 0.

Workaround

Use --ep openvino instead of --ep ov; the catalog listing succeeds with that spelling.

Scope and evidence

This is help/parser consistency for catalog listing. It does not involve OpenVINO inference, does not require claiming OpenVINO hardware coverage, and is not a QNN inference failure. Either accept the documented alias consistently or remove the unsupported alias from help.

The following evidence is retained locally by the reporter; these filenames are an index, not uploaded attachments:

• catalog-documented-ov-alias.stderr.log
• catalog-openvino-alias.stdout.log