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I am running Debian on a VM. I login to the GUI and go to Applications > Accessories > Terminal.

# echo shell: /bin/bash

I modified ENV_SUPATH, ENV_PATH inside of /etc/login.defs. I restarted the shell. In superuser mode echo $PATH shows my update. In normal mode echo $PATH does not show my update. I added and modified ~/.bash_profile. I still can't see my change and I'm starting to chase my tail.

/etc/login.defs contents:

ENV_SUPATH      PATH=/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin:/home/brian/.linuxbrew/bin
ENV_PATH        PATH=/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/local/games:/usr/games:/home/brian/.linuxbrew/bin

~/.bash_profile:

PATH=/home/brian/.linuxbrew/bin:$PATH

How can I troubleshoot and resolve this?

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  • I may be wrong but I seem to recall that ENV_PATH in /etc/login.defs is now obsolete and ignored.
    – fpmurphy
    Feb 28, 2015 at 15:51
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    Please edit your question and explain how you are logging in to this machine. Are you running a login or a non-login shell?
    – terdon ♦
    Feb 28, 2015 at 15:52
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    unix.stackexchange.com/a/122430/25985
    – goldilocks
    Feb 28, 2015 at 15:56

1 Answer 1

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Short answer: also adjust /etc/profile (and /etc/sudoers carefully)

Long answer: The PATH variable is defined in multiple places.

According to login.defs(5), only su uses it.

The sudo has it's own secure PATH definition in /etc/sudoers (variable secure_path=...)

Most Unix shell will read /etc/profile and ~/.profile. In Debian, this file is used to define login shell's PATH. Bash also reads ~/.bash_profile, ~/.bash_login.

...and probably more (run grep '\<PATH\>' /etc/ -R)

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