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Shashank Sawant
Asked: 2012-05-26 22:30:00 +0800 CST

Is there a GUI to edit the PATH variable?

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There's a GUI in Windows to edit the path variable. I was wondering if there's something equivalent in Ubuntu to do the same.

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1 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    Thing is... path is set inside several text files based on what you want to accomplish, like in ~/.profile for the user, /etc/profile as a default for users, /etc/environment for the system or /etc/bash.bashrc for system wide interactive bash shells. In some of these $PATH is set as part of some coding.

    So a text editor is the most logical thing to use. Like gedit if you want it graphical but you will still be looking at the same type of deal as with nano or vi from commandline. But it will not be possible with something where you edit in some directories with an input box to browse directories since in Linux PATH can have some more logic to it than simply editing a variable.

    My advice: get used to command line editing for things like this and similar things. It will one day help you fix your problems when not being able to login or Unity crashing just after login.

    There is more likely to be a reason for it being done this way. Linux has many more ways of doing things then either of us will ever use but that does not mean someone else does not need them.

    For Latex I would suggest adding it to /etc/bash.bashrc. That is the place to edit path for system wide bash shells. 

    gksu gedit /etc/bash.bashrc

    After adding it in and saving you can check with

    echo $PATH

    if it is set correctly (and this will be permament).

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