Re: bash 4.x filters out environmental variables containing a dot in the name

[Andreas Schwab]

Chet Ramey <chet.ramey@case.edu> writes:

> It's not a bug.  Posix explicitly restricts environment variable names
> to consist of uppercase letters, lowercase letters, digits, and
> underscores.

POSIX only talks about their use in POSIX utilities.  It does not say
anything about non-POSIX utilities and extensions (and using other
characters _is_ a proper extension).

> There is no provision for variables with invalid names that don't
> exactly exist and are just passed down to applications in their
> environment.

POSIX explicitly says that other characters may be permitted, and Unix
does permit them, just like Unix permits any character except / and NUL
in filenames.

Andreas.

-- 
Andreas Schwab, schwab@linux-m68k.org
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