On Mac/Linux you can configure your environment variables easily by editing the ~/.bash_profile or the .bashrc file.
However in Windows one normally launches the Control Panel > System > Advanced System Settings, go to the Advanced tab then click the “Environment Variables…” button.
The downside of of this is that the input field provided by windows is very small which is a problem when you are editing the PATH variable. One usually has to copy the value out to a text editor, edit it the paste it back in.
I was helping a colleague configure his environment and I noticed that he was configuring his variables in a bat file. I have since left the project so I’m not sure how he was doing it. I’ve come up with my own solution here.
Basically the solution is:
1. Create a bat file
2. Add a shortcut to this bat file the start up items folder
3. In the bat file use the “setx” command
So I have a bat file here: c:\config\environment.variables.bat
I put a shortcut to it into: C:\Users\\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup
Then this file looks like this:
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set
PHP=C:\PHP5.3.3\
set
PERL=C:\Perl64\site\bin
set
PERL64=C:\Perl64\bin
set
IMAGE_MAGICK=C:\Program Files (x86)\ImageMagick-6.5.6-Q8
set
IMAGE_MAGICK16=C:\Program Files (x86)\ImageMagick-6.6.3-Q16
set
RUBY=C:\Ruby187\bin
set
RUBY2=%RUBY_HOME%\bin
set
GRAILS=%GRAILS_HOME%\bin
set
ANT=%ANT_HOME%\bin
set
M2=%M2_HOME%\bin
set
ROOT=%SystemRoot%\system32
set
WBEM=%SystemRoot%\System32\Wbem
set
POWERSHELL=%SYSTEMROOT%\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\
set
SVN=C:\Program Files\SlikSvn\bin\
set
PERFORCE=C:\Program Files\Perforce
set
TOMCAT=%TOMCAT_HOME%\bin
set
MYSQL=C:\Program Files\MySQL\MySQL Server 5.1\bin
set
GIT=C:\Program Files (x86)\Git\cmd
set
QUICKTIME=C:\Program Files (x86)\QuickTime\QTSystem\
set
SBT=C:\Users\eeustace\dev\lift\sbt
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As you can see I’m using this to configure my PATH variable, but I could easily configure the other environment variables also.
Setx is a command in windows 7 that allows you to configure environment variables. More info here.
What do you think – useful?