"not a valid identifier" when I do "export $PATH"
Running export $PATH
will try to export a variable with a name equal to the value of $PATH
(after word splitting). That is, it's equivalent to writing something like export /usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin
. And since /usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin
is not a valid variable name, it fails. What you want to do is export PATH
.
export
(equivalent to declare -x
) in Bash simply makes the variable available to subshells.
To print the value of a variable safely and readably, use printf %q "$PATH"
.
The following command export $PATH=somePath
will return not a valid identifier
and that is because of the $
before the PATH
variable.
solution:
export PATH=somePath
You should use it this way:
export PATH=$PATH:/something/bin
Instead of:
export $PATH=$PATH:/something/bin
just remove the $
sign from the left hand side.