Unix / Linux: Initialize Dot Files Without Restarting The Current Shell Session
I
‘m a new Linux, OS X or Unix-like system users. I’m using bash shell. I made changes to my $HOME/.profile ($HOME/.bash_profile) file. How can I restart my session without doing logout and login again?
You can always initialize your shell startup files without restarting a Unix or Linux based session. The command and input file name depends upon your shell you are using. You can use the following command to find out your shell name:
echo $SHELL
Sample outputs:
/bin/csh
Restart a Unix/Linux session based on ksh or bash shell
The syntax is:
. $HOME/.profile
. $HOME/.bash_profile
or Use source command ##
source $HOME/.profile
source $HOME/.bash_profile
The source or . is a shell builtin commands to read and execute commands from given FILENAM. If you have created a $HOME/.bashrc file, type:
. $HOME/.bashrc
or
source $HOME/.bashrc
Restart a Unix/Linux session based on csh or tcsh shell
The syntax is as follows for csh/tcsh based shell:
source .cshrc
source .login
For more info see your shell man pages – bash(1),tcsh(1),ksh(1) or type the following command:
help source
help .