The Joy of Penguins : Linux System Administration

Linux System Administration

Shells

The Command Path

How can we change the PATH ?

In a shell, type the following:

                [guest@localhost ~]$ echo $PATH
                /usr/kerberos/bin:/usr/local/bin:/bin:/usr/bin:/usr/X11R6/bin:/home/guest/bin

                [guest@localhost ~]$ PATH=/sbin:$PATH

                [guest@localhost ~]$ echo $PATH
                /sbin:/usr/kerberos/bin:/usr/local/bin:/bin:/usr/bin:/usr/X11R6/bin:/home/guest/bin

This changes the PATH for this shell. If you open a new shell, then PATH will be the default.
Note that the shell looks for a command from left to right along the PATH.

The command above will look in /sbin first. If you want to look in /sbin last, do the following:

                [guest@localhost ~]$ echo $PATH
                /usr/kerberos/bin:/usr/local/bin:/bin:/usr/bin:/usr/X11R6/bin:/home/guest/bin
                [guest@localhost ~]$ PATH=$PATH:/sbin
                [guest@localhost ~]$ echo $PATH
                /usr/kerberos/bin:/usr/local/bin:/bin:/usr/bin:/usr/X11R6/bin:/home/guest/bin:/sbin

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