Print file path linux

Display or print UNIX / Linux path

I am a new Linux or Unix system user and I am using a Debian Linux VPS. How do I print current path settings under BASH or sh or ksh shell?

In Linux or Unix-like file systems, the human-readable address of a resource is defined by PATH shell variable. On Unix / Linux like operating systems, (as well as on DOS / Windows and its descendants), PATH is an environment variable listing a set of paths to directories where executable may be found. This page explains how to print path variable using various commands under Linux and Unix-like systems.

Tutorial details
Difficulty level	Easy
Root privileges	No
Requirements	Linux, Unix, or macOS terminal app
Est. reading time	2 minutes

Display current PATH in Linux

Use the echo command as follows:
echo «$PATH»
Here is my settings from Debian Linux system:

You can use the printf command as well to show the current PATH settings:
$ printf «%s\n» $PATH
Here is my settings from macOS/macOS X Unix desktop:

What is a PATH in Linux or Unix?

A PATH is nothing but the search path for commands. It is a colon-separated list of directories in which the shell looks for commands.

How to modify current PATH

Use the export command to add /opt/games to PATH, enter:
export PATH=$PATH:/opt/games
To format your PATH variable for easy viewing, add following code to your bash startup file (such as

• No ads and tracking
• In-depth guides for developers and sysadmins at Opensourceflare✨
• Join my Patreon to support independent content creators and start reading latest guides:
  • How to set up Redis sentinel cluster on Ubuntu or Debian Linux
  • How To Set Up SSH Keys With YubiKey as two-factor authentication (U2F/FIDO2)
  • How to set up Mariadb Galera cluster on Ubuntu or Debian Linux
  • A podman tutorial for beginners – part I (run Linux containers without Docker and in daemonless mode)
  • How to protect Linux against rogue USB devices using USBGuard

Join Patreon ➔

Now just run path:
$ path
Here is what I see on CentOS/RHEL/Fedora Linux:

Another option is to run the following command:
echo «$PATH» | tr «:» «\n» | nl

Fig.01: Printing $PATH on Linux or Unix-like system

Summing up

The default shell path ( $PATH variable) is system-dependent, and is set by the administrator who installs bash or ksh or any other shell. However, developers and other Linux and Unix system users can set up their own path using the export command under bash/sh/ksh.

Setting up PATH permanently

Users can edit the

/.profile to set up their path as follows for bash:

Printing PATH in Linux or Unix

Now run:
echo «$PATH»
printf «%s\n», $PATH

How to Checking Path in Unix and Linux

🐧 Get the latest tutorials on Linux, Open Source & DevOps via

Category	List of Unix and Linux commands
Documentation	help • mandb • man • pinfo
Disk space analyzers	df • duf • ncdu • pydf
File Management	cat • cp • less • mkdir • more • tree
Firewall	Alpine Awall • CentOS 8 • OpenSUSE • RHEL 8 • Ubuntu 16.04 • Ubuntu 18.04 • Ubuntu 20.04
Linux Desktop Apps	Skype • Spotify • VLC 3
Modern utilities	bat • exa
Network Utilities	NetHogs • dig • host • ip • nmap
OpenVPN	CentOS 7 • CentOS 8 • Debian 10 • Debian 8/9 • Ubuntu 18.04 • Ubuntu 20.04
Package Manager	apk • apt
Processes Management	bg • chroot • cron • disown • fg • glances • gtop • jobs • killall • kill • pidof • pstree • pwdx • time • vtop
Searching	ag • grep • whereis • which
Shell builtins	compgen • echo • printf
Text processing	cut • rev
User Information	groups • id • lastcomm • last • lid/libuser-lid • logname • members • users • whoami • who • w
WireGuard VPN	Alpine • CentOS 8 • Debian 10 • Firewall • Ubuntu 20.04

Comments on this entry are closed.

accepts an optional argument that is the name of a path-like variable.

Hi,
I did not get either of those path() working. I assume my version of unix does not recognize IFS when applying printf. But this works:

echo $PATH | sed ‘s/\:/\n/g’ | sort

Thanks for that, Pekka. I started using zsh, which has the same problem you described. The original solution works wonderfully in bash, but yours works in zsh.

Ugghh curly quotes. Could not copy and paste.

I am using Zshell, Prezto, OSX. The sed command replaces the : with an n

To get one path per line I used:

Hello Sir;
I am trying to run a program on a cluster and every time I run the program I have this message: mpiexec was unable to launch the specified application as it could not find an executable. ”
so I am suggesting that the program is not recognize the mpixec path. so I need to add the MPI path in my working directory.
my question is how to set this up?

hola necesito decargar un editor ok lo descargo en superusuario y cuando esta descargando me dice q no puede continuar … me aparece esto : dpkg: aviso: `ldconfig’ no se ha encontrado en el PATH o no es ejecutable.
dpkg: aviso: `start-stop-daemon’ no se ha encontrado en el PATH o no es ejecutable.
dpkg: error: 2 expected programs not found in PATH or not executable.
Note: root’s PATH should usually contain /usr/local/sbin, /usr/sbin and /sbin.
E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (2)
Un paquete no se pudo instalar. Tratando de recuperarlo:
dpkg: aviso: `ldconfig’ no se ha encontrado en el PATH o no es ejecutable.
dpkg: aviso: `start-stop-daemon’ no se ha encontrado en el PATH o no es ejecutable.
dpkg: error: 2 expected programs not found in PATH or not executable.
Note: root’s PATH should usually contain /usr/local/sbin, /usr/sbin and /sbin.
help me..

In below code:
Node=/liferay-portal-5.2.0/jboss-tomcat-4.2.3/server/node_portal
export jboss=$Node/../..
echo $jboss

But I need Output as :

Please help me out in this.

How can I make PATH easily to view when I just execute the script? Thanks

You can search/replace within variables as you expand them.
The following replaces ‘:’ with newlines while expanding $PATH, so it’s done without using external commands:

Источник

Переменная PATH в Linux

Когда вы запускаете программу из терминала или скрипта, то обычно пишете только имя файла программы. Однако, ОС Linux спроектирована так, что исполняемые и связанные с ними файлы программ распределяются по различным специализированным каталогам. Например, библиотеки устанавливаются в /lib или /usr/lib, конфигурационные файлы в /etc, а исполняемые файлы в /sbin/, /usr/bin или /bin.

Таких местоположений несколько. Откуда операционная система знает где искать требуемую программу или её компонент? Всё просто — для этого используется переменная PATH. Эта переменная позволяет существенно сократить длину набираемых команд в терминале или в скрипте, освобождая от необходимости каждый раз указывать полные пути к требуемым файлам. В этой статье мы разберёмся зачем нужна переменная PATH Linux, а также как добавить к её значению имена своих пользовательских каталогов.

Переменная PATH в Linux

Для того, чтобы посмотреть содержимое переменной PATH в Linux, выполните в терминале команду:

На экране появится перечень папок, разделённых двоеточием. Алгоритм поиска пути к требуемой программе при её запуске довольно прост. Сначала ОС ищет исполняемый файл с заданным именем в текущей папке. Если находит, запускает на выполнение, если нет, проверяет каталоги, перечисленные в переменной PATH, в установленном там порядке. Таким образом, добавив свои папки к содержимому этой переменной, вы добавляете новые места размещения исполняемых и связанных с ними файлов.

Для того, чтобы добавить новый путь к переменной PATH, можно воспользоваться командой export. Например, давайте добавим к значению переменной PATH папку/opt/local/bin. Для того, чтобы не перезаписать имеющееся значение переменной PATH новым, нужно именно добавить (дописать) это новое значение к уже имеющемуся, не забыв о разделителе-двоеточии:

Теперь мы можем убедиться, что в переменной PATH содержится также и имя этой, добавленной нами, папки:

Вы уже знаете как в Linux добавить имя требуемой папки в переменную PATH, но есть одна проблема — после перезагрузки компьютера или открытия нового сеанса терминала все изменения пропадут, ваша переменная PATH будет иметь то же значение, что и раньше. Для того, чтобы этого не произошло, нужно закрепить новое текущее значение переменной PATH в конфигурационном системном файле.

В ОС Ubuntu значение переменной PATH содержится в файле /etc/environment, в некоторых других дистрибутивах её также можно найти и в файле /etc/profile. Вы можете открыть файл /etc/environment и вручную дописать туда нужное значение:

sudo vi /etc/environment

Можно поступить и иначе. Содержимое файла .bashrc выполняется при каждом запуске оболочки Bash. Если добавить в конец файла команду export, то для каждой загружаемой оболочки будет автоматически выполняться добавление имени требуемой папки в переменную PATH, но только для текущего пользователя:

Выводы

В этой статье мы рассмотрели вопрос о том, зачем нужна переменная окружения PATH в Linux и как добавлять к её значению новые пути поиска исполняемых и связанных с ними файлов. Как видите, всё делается достаточно просто. Таким образом вы можете добавить столько папок для поиска и хранения исполняемых файлов, сколько вам требуется.

Источник

Understanding file paths and how to use them in Linux | Opensource.com

If you’re used to drag-and-drop environments, then file paths may be frustrating. Learn here how they work, and some basic tricks to make using them easier.

Subscribe now

Get the highlights in your inbox every week.

A file path is the human-readable representation of a file or folder’s location on a computer system. You’ve seen file paths, although you may not realize it, on the internet: An internet URL, despite ancient battles fought by proprietary companies like AOL and CompuServe, is actually just a path to a (sometimes dynamically created) file on someone else’s computer. For instance, when you navigate to example.com/index.html, you are actually viewing the HTML file index.html, probably located in the var directory on the example.com server. Files on your computer have file paths, too, and this article explains how to understand them, and why they’re important.

When computers became a household item, they took on increasingly stronger analogies to real-world models. For instance, instead of accounts and directories, personal computers were said to have desktops and folders, and eventually, people developed the latent impression that the computer was a window into a virtual version of the real world. It’s a useful analogy, because everyone is familiar with the concept of desktops and file cabinets, while fewer people understand digital storage and memory addresses.

As it turns out, the creators of UNIX had the same instinct, only they called these units of organization directories or folders. All files on your computer’s drive are in the system’s base (root) directory. Even external drives are brought into this root directory, just as you might place important related items into one container if you were organizing your office space or hobby room.

Files and folders on Linux are given names containing the usual components like the letters, numbers, and other characters on a keyboard. But when a file is inside a folder, or a folder is inside another folder, the / character shows the relationship between them. That’s why you often see files listed in the format /usr/bin/python3 or /etc/os-release. The forward slashes indicate that one item is stored inside of the item preceding it.

Every file and folder on a POSIX system can be expressed as a path. If I have the file penguin.jpg in the Pictures folder within my home directory, and my username is seth, then the file path can be expressed as /home/seth/Pictures/penguin.jpg.

Most users interact primarily with their home directory, so the tilde (

Practice makes perfect

Computers use file paths whether you’re thinking of what that path is or not. There’s not necessarily a reason for you to have to think of files in terms of a path. However, file paths are part of a useful framework for understanding how computers work, and learning to think of files in a path can be useful if you’re looking to become a developer (you need to understand the paths to support libraries), a web designer (file paths ensure you’re pointing your HTML to the appropriate CSS), a system administrator, or just a power user.

When in doubt, drag and drop

If you’re not used to thinking of the structure of your hard drive as a path, then it can be difficult to construct a full path for an arbitrary file. On Linux, most file managers either natively display (or have the option to) the full file path to where you are, which helps reinforce the concept on a daily basis:

dolphin-file-path.jpg

If you’re using a terminal, it might help to know that modern terminals, unlike the teletype machines they emulate, can accept files by way of drag-and-drop. When you copying a file to a server over SSH, for instance, and you’re not certain of how to express the file path, try dragging the file from your GUI file manager into your terminal. The GUI object representing the file gets translated into a text file path in the terminal:

terminal-drag-drop.jpg

Don’t waste time typing in guesses. Just drag and drop.

Tab is your friend

On a system famous for eschewing three-letter commands when two or even one-letter commands will do, rest assured that no seasoned POSIX user ever types out everything. In the Bash shell, the Tab key means autocomplete, and autocomplete never lies. For instance, to type the example penguin.jpg file’s location, you can start with:

and then press the Tab key. As long as there is only one item starting with Pi, the folder Pictures autocompletes for you.

If there are two or more items starting with the letters you attempt to autocomplete, then Bash displays what those items are. You manually type more until you reach a unique string that the shell can safely autocomplete. The best thing about this process isn’t necessarily that it saves you from typing (though that’s definitely a selling point), but that autocomplete is never wrong. No matter how much you fight the computer to autocomplete something that isn’t there, in the end, you’ll find that autocomplete understands paths better than anyone.

Assume that you, in a fit of late-night reorganization, move penguin.jpg from your

/Pictures folder to your

/Spheniscidae directory. You fall asleep and wake up refreshed, but with no memory that you’ve reorganized, so you try to copy

/Pictures/penguin.jpg to your web server, in the terminal, using autocomplete.

No matter how much you pound on the Tab key, Bash refuses to autocomplete. The file you want simply does not exist in the location where you think it exists. That feature can be helpful when you’re trying to point your web page to a font or CSS file you were sure you’d uploaded, or when you’re pointing a compiler to a library you’re 100% positive you already compiled.

This isn’t your grandma’s autocompletion

If you like Bash’s autocompletion, you’ll come to scoff at it once you try the autocomplete in Zsh. The Z shell, along with the Oh My Zsh site, provides a dynamic experience filled with plugins for specific programming languages and environments, visual themes packed with useful feedback, and a vibrant community of passionate shell users:

zsh-simple.jpg

If you’re a visual thinker and find the display of most terminals stagnant and numbing, Zsh may well change the way you interact with your computer.

Practice more

File paths are important on any system. You might be a visual thinker who prefers to think of files as literal documents inside of literal folders, but the computer sees files and folders as named tags in a pool of data. The way it identifies one collection of data from another is by following its designated path. If you understand these paths, you can also come to visualize them, and you can speak the same language as your OS, making file operations much, much faster.

Источник