[plug] setting environment variables

[Denis Brown]

Hello, Steve...

On Fri, 9 Apr 2004, James Devenish wrote:

> Hi,
>
> In message <6.0.0.22.0.20040409144527.01ae1920 at pop.ozemail.com.au>
> on Fri, Apr 09, 2004 at 02:54:35PM +0800, smclevie wrote:
> > I have changed my MAILPATH in a .profile file in my home directory and yet
> > when I "echo $MAILPATH" I get nothing!!
>
> You have taken the right approach.
>
> > Why is my .profile file not observed??
>
> Details about .profile can be found in the documentation for your
> "shell". It is likely that your shell is "bash" (that's the name of the
> programme). You can find the documentation in "the bash man page" or
> "the bash info file". I think the short answer is that .profile is only
>
   <snip useful content>

As James says, the profile file for bash would be .bash_profile which
includes .bashrc

I usually set my session-specific requirements in .bashrc as, for example

export FSLDIR=/data/fsl

and then when I'm logged in an echo $FSLDIR returns /data/fsl

Note that (in Debian at least) there is a system-wide profile file in /etc
simply called profile (no . prefix)   That allows you to set up parameters
for all users on the system.   The only .profile file I've seen on a
Debian system is in root's "/root" directory.   All normal users have the
.bash_profile and .bashrc files in their home directories.

HTH but there are far more experienced eyes on this list, so if I've made
a gaff...   :-)
Denis

PS.   I set up mutt and exim on one of my Debian machines a loooong time
ago and it Just Works (tm) so I'm very rusty on what had to be done.   If
it is still relevant to you I can probably dig up my notes after the
Easter break.   I do recall having to use debconf to set up exim.   Onno
mentioned qpopper and I did install that to allow my trusty Eudora to
access the machine.   Pretty sure that I got mutt working without qpopper,
though.   HTH.