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Using CENTOS 7 and BASH, after creating a new user, the user has repeating lines in the path variable.

I've looked at this site $PATH duplication issues but it's for a .zshrc. Also, this is for the default profile just after a new user is added, so I'm not doing anything extra.

For example, if I create the user 'bob' and then view bob's path, it looks like this:

$ echo "${PATH//:/$'\n'}"
/usr/lib64/qt-3.3/bin
/sbin
/bin
/usr/bin
/usr/local/bin
/usr/local/sbin
/usr/sbin
/home/bob/.local/bin
/home/bob/bin
/home/bob/.local/bin
/home/bob/bin
/home/bob/.local/bin
/home/bob/bin

As you can see, both /home/bob/.local/bin and /home/bob/bin are in the path 3 times. The new (default) .bash_profile contains the following lines for the path variable:

PATH=$PATH:$HOME/.local/bin:$HOME/bin
export PATH

Also, anytime I add on a new path to the existing one in .bash_profile, the new (added) path also repeats itself. For example, adding /opt/mystuff to the path will repeat itself...

PATH=$PATH:$HOME/.local/bin:$HOME/bin:/opt/mystuff
export PATH

Will yield...

$ echo "${PATH//:/$'\n'}"
/usr/lib64/qt-3.3/bin
/sbin
/bin
/usr/bin
/usr/local/bin
/usr/local/sbin
/usr/sbin
/home/bob/.local/bin
/home/bob/bin
/opt/mystuff
/home/bob/.local/bin
/home/bob/bin
/opt/mystuff
/home/bob/.local/bin
/home/bob/bin
/opt/mystuff

So, why are these path lines repeating themselves and is it a problem?

If it is a problem, how can I fix it?

Thanks for any & all help.

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  • PATH=$PATH:$HOME/.local/bin:$HOME/bin takes the current value of $PATH, and sticks :$HOME/.local/bin:$HOME/bin at its end. And PATH=$PATH:$HOME/.local/bin:$HOME/bin:/opt/mystuff takes the now-current value of $PATH and sticks :$HOME/.local/bin:$HOME/bin:/opt/mystuff at the end... So you get $HOME/.local/bin and $HOME/bin twice. Perhaps you have a similar assignment somewhere a third time?
    – ilkkachu
    Dec 25, 2022 at 18:44
  • Do you source ~/.bash_profile repeatedly from e.g. ~/.bashrc?
    – tink
    Dec 25, 2022 at 21:23

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