xref: /netbsd-src/share/man/man7/environ.7 (revision ce63d6c20fc4ec8ddc95c84bb229e3c4ecf82b69)
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32.\"	@(#)environ.7	6.6 (Berkeley) 7/19/91
33.\"
34.Dd July 19, 1991
35.Dt ENVIRON 7
36.Os BSD 4.2
37.Sh NAME
38.Nm environ
39.Nd user environment
40.Sh SYNOPSIS
41.Ar extern char **environ ;
42.Sh DESCRIPTION
43An array of strings called the
44.Ar environment
45is made available by
46.Xr execve  2
47when a process begins.  By convention these strings have the form
48.Dq Ar name=value .
49The following names are used by various commands:
50.Bl -tag -width Fl
51.It Ev EXINIT
52A startup list of commands read by
53.Xr ex  1  ,
54.Xr edit  1 ,
55and
56.Xr vi  1  .
57.It Ev HOME
58A user's login directory, set by
59.Xr login  1
60from the password file
61.Xr passwd  5  .
62.It Ev PATH
63The sequence of directories, separated by colons, searched by
64.Xr csh  1  ,
65.Xr sh  1 ,
66.Xr system  3  ,
67.Xr execvp  3 ,
68etc, when looking for an executable file.
69PATH is set to ``:/usr/ucb:/bin:/usr/bin'' initially by
70.Xr login  1  .
71.It Ev PRINTER
72The name of the default printer to be used by
73.Xr lpr  1  ,
74.Xr lpq  1 ,
75and
76.Xr lprm  1  .
77.It Ev SHELL
78The full pathname of the user's login shell.
79.It Ev TERM
80The kind of terminal for which output is to be prepared.
81This information is used by commands, such as
82.Xr nroff  1
83or
84.Xr plot 1
85which may exploit special terminal capabilities.  See
86.Pa /usr/share/misc/termcap
87.Pq Xr tmercap 5
88for a list of terminal types.
89.It Ev TERMCAP
90The string describing the terminal in TERM, or, if
91it begins with a '/', the name of the termcap file.
92See
93.Ev TERMPATH
94below,
95.Xr termcap  5  ,
96and
97.Xr termcap  .
98.It Ev TERMPATH
99A sequence of pathnames of termcap files, separated by colons or spaces,
100which are searched for terminal descriptions in the order listed.  Having
101no
102.Ev TERMPATH
103is equivalent to a
104.Ev TERMPATH
105of
106.Dq Pa $HOME/.termcap:/etc/termcap .
107.Ev TERMPATH
108is ignored if
109.Ev TERMCAP
110contains a full pathname.
111.It Ev USER
112The login name of the user.
113.El
114.Pp
115Further names may be placed in the environment by the
116.Xr export
117command and
118.Ar name=value
119arguments in
120.Xr sh  1  ,
121or by the
122.Xr setenv
123command if you use
124.Xr csh  1  .
125It is unwise to change certain
126.Xr sh  1
127variables that are frequently exported by
128.Pa .profile
129files, such as
130.Ev MAIL ,
131.Ev PS1 ,
132.Ev PS2 ,
133and
134.Ev IFS ,
135unless you know what you are doing.
136.Sh SEE ALSO
137.Xr csh 1 ,
138.Xr ex 1 ,
139.Xr login 1 ,
140.Xr sh 1 ,
141.Xr execve 2 ,
142.Xr execle 3 ,
143.Xr system 3 ,
144.Xr termcap 3 ,
145.Xr termcap 5
146.Sh HISTORY
147The
148.Nm environ
149manual page appeared in
150.Bx 4.2 .
151