Executing commands without using the full path..

LinuxBAH · 11-30-2003, 05:22 PM

If I type startx or aterm in any directory or any terminal it will load. But for programs like mozilla I have to type out the full path to start it. I heard there is a place to put these paths to make them executable with just the program name but I dunno what it's called so wading thru the handbook and docs I'm not even sure what I'm looking for. Does this make sense? I'm still a bit noobish so I hope it does. Thx in advance.

chort · 11-30-2003, 05:49 PM

You're talking about the PATH environment variable. It can be set in the profile for your shell. For sh/ksh (and bash too, under certain circumstances) that would be ~/.profile. bash normally checks for ~/.bash_profile first and uses that if it exists. csh uses ~/.login.

nullpt · 12-02-2003, 07:16 PM

Well, if it's a binary or a script of any kind and it's located in one of the directories listed in $PATH , u just need to rehash so you can call that program/script without using the full path.