Hi,

I have this problem where I sometimes reinstall software in /usr/local that was previously installed in /usr . After uninstalling what is in /usr, I run the command at I get something like:

r@pal:~$ pd
bash: /usr/bin/pd: No such file or directory

This is because pd is now in /usr/local/bin:

r@pal:~$ which pd
/usr/local/bin/pd

But this has not been recognized by bash, and won't be until i reboot. Is there any way to manually update this?

regards,
Rich

You don't need to reboot. Just restart the X server with ctrl+alt+backspace, and log back in.

You could also try cd to your home folder and run ". .bashrc" or "source .bashrc" to reload your bash environment.

Ah, great. Thanks for the solution, I knew it would be some quick command.

Would you mind telling me what the 'source' command does? It doesn't appear to have a man page.

regards,
Rich

source (or .) is a bash builtin. You can read about it in the bash(1) manpages.

It is better to edit ~/.profile to add directories in your path. This bash script is executed when you log in. Bashrc might not be unless .profile sources it. And in that case, when opening a konsole or xterm or running a subshell the directories will be added again.

See the info bash manual. There could be a different bash startup file used instead such as .bash_login or .bash_profile. The info manual outlines the precedence. For most Linux distro's .profile is used but you can never be certain without checking.

Hey There,

It sounds like, maybe, your issue is also with the way bash is hashing recently used commands. Any shock (like a reboot) to the shell will cause it to dump (and forget that /usr/bin/somecommand is there when it's not), so all the other suggestions are excellent and valid. I just wanted to put these 2 cents in, in case it helps.

"hash -r" might be an easy way for you to just get it over with and not wait

Ex:

Hope that helps out

, Mike

Yes. This is the trick.

The distro doesn't matter, and it's a bash thing only.

.profile might not be the right file either.

For interactive non-login sessions (i.e. xterm and the likes) use .bashrc, for login shells (when login in text mode, via ssh, etc) use .bash_profile, which will take precedence over any other. For global configs use /etc/profile.

More info in the "INVOCATION" section of the bash man page.

However, this is NOT a PATH issue. If /usr/local/bin wasn't in the path, no amount of reboot would help, right? So I guess that it's eggixyz who hit the nail.

About the source (or dot) command, it's a bash builtin which dumps a given shell script into the current shell, as if you typed all the commands into that file in your command line, hence, all the environment of that shell script is merged into your current shell (including whatever modifications to PATH have been done).