Re: [newbie] Need help understanding path mechanisms

[Anthony]

Does just plain "su" work?

 I share a box with three other people and we are having a murderous time
 getting the paths correct.  Can anyone explain the secrets of setting up
 paths?  
 
 The current problem is all of us have the path setup correctly under our
 usernames.  If we 'su - root' the paths are still correct.  However, if we
 'su root', no dash, then for two of us the paths are correct but for the
 other, her path's are screwed up.  We are all using bash.  I don't know
 where to look to figure out why she is the only one having a problem doing
 'su root' and having the correct paths loaded.

-- 
Anthony
http://binaryfusion.net
Computers are not intelligent. They only think they are. 

Re: [newbie] Need help understanding path mechanisms

[Larry Marshall]

  The current problem is all of us have the path setup correctly under our
  usernames.  If we 'su - root' the paths are still correct.  However, if we 'su 
root', no dash, then for two of us the paths are correct but for the
  other, her path's are screwed up.  We are all using bash.  I don't know
  where to look to figure out why she is the only one having a problem doing 'su 
root' and having the correct paths loaded.

Could you define "path setup correctly", "correct paths" and "path's
are screwed up"???  Are you talking about physical paths or paths that
will be searched when you execute a command? 

If the later, the paths will be determined why who you "are".  If you
log in as root, the paths will be determined by the shell config for
root, not the config for a user.  Check the .bashrc file in the root
directory and compare it to the one in your user account folders.  I
suspect you'll find your answers there.

Cheers --- Larry

[newbie] Need help understanding path mechanisms

[Mark Johnson]

I share a box with three other people and we are having a murderous time
getting the paths correct.  Can anyone explain the secrets of setting up
paths?  

The current problem is all of us have the path setup correctly under our
usernames.  If we 'su - root' the paths are still correct.  However, if we
'su root', no dash, then for two of us the paths are correct but for the
other, her path's are screwed up.  We are all using bash.  I don't know
where to look to figure out why she is the only one having a problem doing
'su root' and having the correct paths loaded.

thanks for the help...

Re: [newbie] Need help understanding path mechanisms

[lselinger]

I share a box with three other people and we are having a murderous time
getting the paths correct.  Can anyone explain the secrets of setting up
paths?

The current problem is all of us have the path setup correctly under our
usernames.  If we 'su - root' the paths are still correct.  However, if we
'su root', no dash, then for two of us the paths are correct but for the
other, her path's are screwed up.


Do a comparison to find out what the actual path is you are loading
into.for every occurance just type echo $PATH compare and see what the
difference is. Should be an easy fix to edit the ol' .bashrc in whatever
path is NOT being loaded the same as the othersalso will depend on what
you mean by the path not being correct  if you mean once she does an su
root she has no access to things she did prior .. something wierd is going
on (with out the dash you *should* keep your current working path  with
the dash .. you assume the path of the user you switch to) so if switching
user with no dash ... the path will be the same as before you su'd.

Lonny Selinger



We are all using bash.  I don't know
where to look to figure out why she is the only one having a problem doing
'su root' and having the correct paths loaded.

thanks for the help...