LIBAST(3)

welcome to LIBAST(3) from the Library Functions Manual shelf, bestie 🫶 this page is all about environment-variable business and it's lowkey iconic.

🌸 NAME 🌸

setenviron - set environment value 🎀

✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

#include <ast.h>

char*     setenviron(const char* key);

🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

okay so setenviron controls environment name=value pairs. It's giving environment-variable management, but make it cute 💅

• setenviron("name=value") — adds name to the environment and returns a pointer to a strdup(3) copy of name=value. yes, a whole duplicate, slay ✨
• setenviron("name") — removes name from the environment and returns the empty string. poof, gone, no cap 💨
• setenviron(0) — reserves a few slots in an internal array, and it's usually called by a parent process that expects many children. big parent-energy moment 👑
• 0 — returned on error. not the vibe, but we respect the truth 💀

Also, setenviron preserves the ksh(1) convention of _ as the first environment variable name. shell heirloom behavior, iykyk 🐚

🌈 SEE ALSO 🌈

Also see env(1) and exec(2) — go peek, bestie 💖

💀 BUGS 💀

bug alert, bestie 🚨

POSIX will eventually settle on an interface. It has already picked a few of the names we did in .2 drafts. This is about the third name change for ours. literally naming drama 😭

Signed, sealed, and sparkling by LIBAST(3) — source/version mentioned in the footer, and the date is not shown there, so consider this your cute timestamp placeholder 🎀💖 bye bestie, go forth and set those environment variables ✨