Environment variable changing on Linux/FreeBSD

You can change environment variables on a Linux or FreeBSD system by using the export command in a terminal.

For example, to set the PATH environment variable to include the /usr/local/bin directory, you can use the following command:

export PATH=$PATH:/usr/local/bin

This will add the /usr/local/bin directory to the PATH variable, which specifies the directories that the system should search for executable programs.

To set a different environment variable, you can use the same syntax. For example, to set the EDITOR variable to nano, you can use the following command:

export EDITOR=nano

The changes made with the export command are temporary and will only apply to the current terminal session. To make the changes permanent, you can add the export command to the ~/.bashrc file. This file is executed every time you start a new terminal session, and is used to set up the environment for the session.

For example, to set the PATH variable permanently, you can add the following line to the ~/.bashrc file:

export PATH=$PATH:/usr/local/bin

Note: The ~/.bashrc file is specific to the bash shell. If you are using a different shell, you will need to edit the appropriate startup file for that shell.