1.\" Copyright (c) 1988, 1991, 1993 2.\" The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved. 3.\" 4.\" This code is derived from software contributed to Berkeley by 5.\" the American National Standards Committee X3, on Information 6.\" Processing Systems. 7.\" 8.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without 9.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions 10.\" are met: 11.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright 12.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer. 13.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright 14.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the 15.\" documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. 16.\" 4. Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors 17.\" may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software 18.\" without specific prior written permission. 19.\" 20.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND 21.\" ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE 22.\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE 23.\" ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE 24.\" FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL 25.\" DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS 26.\" OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) 27.\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT 28.\" LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY 29.\" OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF 30.\" SUCH DAMAGE. 31.\" 32.\" @(#)getenv.3 8.2 (Berkeley) 12/11/93 33.\" $FreeBSD$ 34.\" 35.Dd June 20, 2007 36.Dt GETENV 3 37.Os 38.Sh NAME 39.Nm getenv , 40.Nm putenv , 41.Nm setenv , 42.Nm unsetenv 43.Nd environment variable functions 44.Sh LIBRARY 45.Lb libc 46.Sh SYNOPSIS 47.In stdlib.h 48.Ft char * 49.Fn getenv "const char *name" 50.Ft int 51.Fn setenv "const char *name" "const char *value" "int overwrite" 52.Ft int 53.Fn putenv "char *string" 54.Ft int 55.Fn unsetenv "const char *name" 56.Sh DESCRIPTION 57These functions set, unset and fetch environment variables from the 58host 59.Em environment list . 60.Pp 61The 62.Fn getenv 63function obtains the current value of the environment variable, 64.Fa name . 65The application should not modify the string pointed 66to by the 67.Fn getenv 68function. 69.Pp 70The 71.Fn setenv 72function inserts or resets the environment variable 73.Fa name 74in the current environment list. 75If the variable 76.Fa name 77does not exist in the list, 78it is inserted with the given 79.Fa value . 80If the variable does exist, the argument 81.Fa overwrite 82is tested; if 83.Fa overwrite 84is zero, the 85variable is not reset, otherwise it is reset 86to the given 87.Fa value . 88.Pp 89The 90.Fn putenv 91function takes an argument of the form ``name=value'' and 92puts it directly into the current environment, 93so altering the argument shall change the environment. 94If the variable 95.Fa name 96does not exist in the list, 97it is inserted with the given 98.Fa value . 99If the variable 100.Fa name 101does exist, it is reset to the given 102.Fa value . 103.Pp 104The 105.Fn unsetenv 106function 107deletes all instances of the variable name pointed to by 108.Fa name 109from the list. 110.Sh RETURN VALUES 111The 112.Fn getenv 113function returns the value of the environment variable as a 114.Dv NUL Ns 115-terminated string. 116If the variable 117.Fa name 118is not in the current environment, 119.Dv NULL 120is returned. 121.Pp 122.Rv -std setenv putenv unsetenv 123.Sh ERRORS 124.Bl -tag -width Er 125.It Bq Er EINVAL 126The function 127.Fn getenv , 128.Fn setenv 129or 130.Fn unsetenv 131failed because the 132.Fa name 133is a 134.Dv NULL 135pointer, points to an empty string, or points to a string containing an 136.Dq Li \&= 137character. 138.Pp 139The function 140.Fn putenv 141failed because 142.Fa string 143is a 144.Dv NULL 145pointer, 146.Fa string is without an 147.Dq Li \&= 148character or 149.Dq Li \&= 150is the first character in 151.Fa string . 152This does not follow the 153.Tn POSIX 154specification. 155.It Bq Er ENOMEM 156The function 157.Fn setenv , 158.Fn unsetenv 159or 160.Fn putenv 161failed because they were unable to allocate memory for the environment. 162.It Bq Er EFAULT 163The functions 164.Fn setenv , 165.Fn unsetenv 166or 167.Fn putenv 168failed to make a valid copy of the environment due to the environment being 169corrupt (i.e., a name without a value). A warning will be output to stderr with 170information about the issue. 171.El 172.Sh SEE ALSO 173.Xr csh 1 , 174.Xr sh 1 , 175.Xr execve 2 , 176.Xr environ 7 177.Sh STANDARDS 178The 179.Fn getenv 180function conforms to 181.St -isoC . 182The 183.Fn setenv , 184.Fn putenv 185and 186.Fn unsetenv 187functions conforms to 188.St -p1003.1-2001 . 189.Sh HISTORY 190The functions 191.Fn setenv 192and 193.Fn unsetenv 194appeared in 195.At v7 . 196The 197.Fn putenv 198function appeared in 199.Bx 4.3 Reno . 200.Pp 201Until 202.Fx 7.0 , 203.Fn putenv 204would make a copy of 205.Fa string 206and insert it into the environment using 207.Fn setenv . 208This was changed to use 209.Fa string 210as the memory location of the ``name=value'' pair to follow the 211.Tn POSIX 212specification. 213.Sh BUGS 214Successive calls to 215.Fn setenv 216that assign a larger-sized 217.Fa value 218than any previous value to the same 219.Fa name 220will result in a memory leak. 221The 222.Fx 223semantics for this function 224(namely, that the contents of 225.Fa value 226are copied and that old values remain accessible indefinitely) make this 227bug unavoidable. 228Future versions may eliminate one or both of these 229semantic guarantees in order to fix the bug. 230