./

[dsr at tao.merseine.nu (dsr at tao.merseine.nu)]

On Mon, Nov 10, 2003 at 06:40:07PM -0500, David Kramer wrote:
> On Monday 10 November 2003 6:15 pm, eric wrote:
> > hi.  both answers i got were great, thanks.  i learned about '.' and
> > cleared up some confusion i had about PATH.  thanks.
> 
> You got some good answers, but I would like to give you one more tip based on 
> what I *think* you're doing.
> 
> Usually . ( the current directory) is in the $PATH for regular users, however 
> it is almost never in the $PATH for root, for the safety reasons already 
> mentioned.   Since . is not in your path, I will assume you are logged in as 
> root.

Let's add another safety tip: don't add . to $PATH for normal users, but
do add ~/bin, and use the /etc/rc.skel or equivalent to create ~/bin for
all new users. When people want to add special commands, putting them in
their local bin is The Right Thing To Do. If they want commands that
other people can generally browse and use, asking a sysadmin to vet it
and put it in /usr/local/bin or whereever system policy dictates is the
Right Thing.

-dsr-

-- 
Network engineer / pre-sales engineer available in the Boston area.
http://tao.merseine.nu/~dsr