.\" $NetBSD: environ.7,v 1.21 2005/07/05 19:46:02 kleink Exp $ .\" .\" Copyright (c) 1983, 1990, 1993 .\" The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved. .\" .\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without .\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions .\" are met: .\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright .\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer. .\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright .\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the .\" documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. .\" 3. Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors .\" may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software .\" without specific prior written permission. .\" .\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND .\" ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE .\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE .\" ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE .\" FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL .\" DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS .\" OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) .\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT .\" LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY .\" OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF .\" SUCH DAMAGE. .\" .\" @(#)environ.7 8.3 (Berkeley) 4/19/94 .\" .Dd July 5, 2005 .Dt ENVIRON 7 .Os .Sh NAME .Nm environ .Nd user process environment .Sh SYNOPSIS .Ar extern char **environ ; .Sh DESCRIPTION An array of strings called the .Em environment is made available by .Xr execve 2 when a process begins. By convention these strings have the form .Dq Ar name=value . The following names are used by various commands: .Bl -tag -width LIBC_DIAGASSERT .It Ev AUDIOCTLDEVICE The name of the audio control device to be used by .Xr audioctl 1 , .Xr audioplay 1 and .Xr audiorecord 1 . .It Ev AUDIODEVICE The name of the audio device to be used by .Xr audioplay 1 and .Xr audiorecord 1 . .It Ev BLOCKSIZE The size of the block units used by several commands, most notably .Xr df 1 , .Xr du 1 and .Xr ls 1 . .Ev BLOCKSIZE may be specified in units of a byte by specifying a number, in units of a kilobyte by specifying a number followed by .Dq K or .Dq k , in units of a megabyte by specifying a number followed by .Dq M or .Dq m and in units of a gigabyte by specifying a number followed by .Dq G or .Dq g . Sizes less than 512 bytes or greater than a gigabyte are ignored. .It Ev EXINIT A startup list of commands read by .Xr ex 1 and .Xr vi 1 . .It Ev HOME A user's login directory, set by .Xr login 1 from the password file .Xr passwd 5 . .It Ev LANG Default for all NLS categories. Only used if .Ev LC_ALL or the environment variable for a particular NLS category is not provided .Ev ( LC_COLLATE , .Ev LC_CTYPE , .Ev LC_MESSAGES , .Ev LC_MONETARY , .Ev LC_NUMERIC , or .Ev LC_TIME ) . .It Ev LC_ALL Override for all NLS categories. If set, overrides the values of .Ev LC_COLLATE , .Ev LC_CTYPE , .Ev LC_MESSAGES , .Ev LC_MONETARY , .Ev LC_NUMERIC , and .Ev LC_TIME . .It Ev LC_COLLATE NLS string-collation order information. .It Ev LC_CTYPE NLS character classification, case conversion, and other character attributes. .It Ev LC_MESSAGES NLS format for affirmative and negative responses. .It Ev LC_MONETARY NLS rules and symbols for formatting monetary numeric information. .It Ev LC_NUMERIC NLS rules and symbols for formatting nonmonetary numeric information. .It Ev LC_TIME NLS rules and symbols for formatting time and date information. .It Ev LIBC_DIAGASSERT Control how the .Fn _DIAGASSERT macro (from .Aq Pa assert.h ) behaves once the assertion is raised. Refer to .Xr _DIAGASSERT 3 for more information. .It Ev LOGNAME The login name of the user. .It Ev MALLOC_OPTIONS Control the behaviour of the .Fn malloc function. Refer to .Xr malloc 3 for more information. .It Ev MIXERDEVICE The name of the audio mixer device to be used by .Xr mixerctl 1 . .It Ev PAGER The program used for paginating the output of several commands such as .Xr man 1 . If null or not set, the standard pagination program .Xr more 1 will be used. .It Ev PATH The sequence of directories, separated by colons, searched by .Xr csh 1 , .Xr sh 1 , .Xr system 3 , .Xr execvp 3 , etc, when looking for an executable file. PATH is set to .Dq /usr/bin:/bin:/usr/pkg/bin:/usr/local/bin initially by .Xr login 1 . .It Ev PRINTER The name of the default printer to be used by .Xr lpr 1 , .Xr lpq 1 , and .Xr lprm 1 . .It Ev RCMD_CMD When using the .Xr rcmd 3 function, this variable is used as the program to run instead of .Xr rcmd 1 . .It Ev SHELL The full pathname of the user's login shell. .It Ev TERM The kind of terminal for which output is to be prepared. This information is used by commands, such as .Xr nroff 1 .\" or .\" .Xr plot 1 which may exploit special terminal capabilities. See .Pa /usr/share/misc/termcap .Pq Xr termcap 5 for a list of terminal types. .It Ev TERMCAP The string describing the terminal in TERM, or, if it begins with a '/', the name of the termcap file. See .Ev TERMPATH below, .Xr termcap 5 , and .Xr termcap 3 . .It Ev TERMPATH A sequence of pathnames of termcap files, separated by colons or spaces, which are searched for terminal descriptions in the order listed. Having no .Ev TERMPATH is equivalent to a .Ev TERMPATH of .Dq Pa $HOME/.termcap:/usr/share/misc/termcap . .Ev TERMPATH is ignored if .Ev TERMCAP contains a full pathname. .It Ev TIMEFORMAT A .Xr strftime 3 format string that may be used by programs such as .Xr dump 8 for formatting timestamps. .It Ev TMPDIR The directory in which to store temporary files. Most applications use either .Pa /tmp or .Pa /var/tmp . Setting this variable will make them use another directory. .It Ev TZ The timezone to use when displaying dates. The normal format is a pathname relative to .Pa /usr/share/zoneinfo . For example, the command .Ic env TZ=US/Pacific date displays the current time in California. See .Xr tzset 3 for more information. .It Ev USER The login name of the user. It is recommended that portable applications use .Ev LOGNAME instead. .El .Pp Further names may be placed in the environment by the .Ic export command and .Ar name=value arguments in .Xr sh 1 , or by the .Ic setenv command if you use .Xr csh 1 . It is unwise to change certain .Xr sh 1 variables that are frequently exported by .Pa .profile files, such as .Ev MAIL , .Ev PS1 , .Ev PS2 , and .Ev IFS , unless you know what you are doing. .Sh SEE ALSO .Xr audioctl 1 , .Xr audioplay 1 , .Xr audiorecord 1 , .Xr csh 1 , .Xr ex 1 , .Xr login 1 , .Xr man 1 , .Xr more 1 , .Xr sh 1 , .Xr execve 2 , .Xr _DIAGASSERT 3 , .Xr execle 3 , .Xr malloc 3 , .Xr rcmd 3 , .Xr system 3 , .Xr termcap 3 , .Xr audio 4 , .Xr termcap 5 , .Xr nls 7 , .Xr dump 8 .Sh HISTORY The .Nm manual page appeared in .Bx 4.2 .