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I am having problems with symbolic links and the $PATH variable.

I have a directory:

# /usr/rulerX/square

where /usr/rulerX/square is a symbolic link such that:

# ls -la
square --> square.hg.current

My path variable is set as:

# echo $PATH
/usr/rulerX/square/bin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin

I have a file, runSquare, under /usr/rulerX/square.hg.current/bin/

Here's the problem:

# runSquare
runSquare: Command Not Found

What gives? If I set /usr/rulerX/square.hg.current/bin to the PATH; everything works fine. However, if I have the symbolic link (just 'square'), it can't find the file.

  • I am using CentOS with csh
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setenv PATH /usr/rulerX/square/bin:$PATH will NOT allow me to execute. – Carlo del Mundo Sep 17 '10 at 15:32
setenv PATH /usr/rulerX/square.hg.current/bin:$PATH however WILL allow me. What's the matter here? – Carlo del Mundo Sep 17 '10 at 15:33
It is good idea to avoid running as root as much as possible. Consider sticking to an unprivileged account and using sudo on those operation that require elevated privilege. – dmckee Sep 17 '10 at 15:48
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migrated from stackoverflow.com Sep 18 '10 at 12:25

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2 Answers

up vote 1 down vote

Some shells (including csh and derivatives) maintain a preprocessed list of files in the directories along PATH to increase searching speed. If your shell is doing that you need to instruct it to rebuild the list.

Typically there is a shell built-in for this, and it is often called rehash.

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up vote 0 down vote

Nevermind; it appears that after a few minutes; the $PATH to /bin/ propagated to the symbolic link.

It could be a bug?

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