Space in Directory Path in $path Variable in Linux

Question

I am using Red Hat Enterprise 5.3, and I'm trying to add a directory to my $path variable, but it has spaces in it. The $path variable is space delimited, so how do I differentiate a space in a absolute path from a space that separates the paths?

Answer 1

Isn't $PATH colon-delimited? Anyway, you need to escape the spaces with \. If you wanted to have a directory called my dir, you'd do something like this:

PATH=/bin /usr/bin /home/user/my\ dir /sbin

This path is just an example, don't copy it verbatim.

Answer 2

It looks like Brad is using csh or tcsh -- these shells have both $path and $PATH. The shell maintains both when you change the one.

The way to add the directory with spaces to $path:

% echo $path
/opt/local/bin /opt/local/sbin /usr/local/bin /usr/local/sbin /Users/dharris/bin
% echo $PATH
/opt/local/bin:/opt/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/Users/dharris/bin

% set path = ($path /tmp/directory\ with\ spaces)

% echo $path
/opt/local/bin /opt/local/sbin /usr/local/bin /usr/local/sbin /Users/dharris/bin /tmp/directory with spaces
% echo $PATH
/opt/local/bin:/opt/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/Users/dharris/bin:/tmp/directory with spaces

Answer 3

In my case (using csh) the $PATH variable was messing it up and preventing $path from working, so here is a workaround:

set savePATH = $PATH
set path = ($path /usr/my\ dir/has\ spaces\ in\ it)
set PATH = ($savePATH)

Caveat: paths with spaces must be added last, if you add a non-space path to path after this, it will automatically update $PATH and break it again.