Set $path fail (win10 subsystem linux, ubuntu, fish shell, brew)

Question

Environment

• OS: Windows Subsystem for Linux, Ubuntu 18.04
• shell: fish
• Tool kit management: brew (homebrew/linuxbrew)
  • fish had installed
    • fish had set as default shell
  • brew had installed
    • brew environment setting as official site
    • php had installed with brew
    • composer had installed with brew

target

I want to use PHP with "php" command which brew had installed but fail.

What I had done

• I try to set environment by myself

  • Following success in current shell but fail when restart shell

  # in bash I tried these
  PATH=${PATH}:/home/linuxbrew/.linuxbrew/bin/
  export PATH=${PATH}:/home/linuxbrew/.linuxbrew/bin/
  
  # in fish bash I tried these
  set PATH $PATH /home/linuxbrew/.linuxbrew/bin/     <-update: updated
  export PATH $PATH:/home/linuxbrew/.linuxbrew/bin/  <-update: wrong
  

  • Following success in bash but fail in fish
    • add the command above in .bashrc file in user directory (.bashrc seems only run when bash)
  • Following should success but fail
    • sudo -H vi /etc/environment
    • add /home/linuxbrew/.linuxbrew/bin/ in it

Answer 1

If you want commands to run when starting fish, you need to put them into a file called "config.fish" in ~/.config/fish/. Bashrc is, as the name implies, specific to bash.

Also "export" is used to mark a variable for "exporting", meaning passing it on to external commands the shell starts. $PATH is usually inherited from whatever starts the shell, which then means it's exported anyway, so your export line is useless.

Also your fish command needs a slight adjustment:

set PATH $PATH /home/linuxbrew/.linuxbrew/bin/

$PATH in fish is a list, and so it needs to be set as multiple arguments, not one string. In fish 3.0 (which was released after Ubuntu 18.04) this was adjusted to automatically split on ":", but even in that case you'll have to quote it or it will have surprising results.