Difference between ADD and ATTACH
"add" is not really a command, but an alias that is defined by the
standard athena dotfiles. The difference between "add" and "attach" is
that
attach only attaches the locker that you specify, whereas
add does many things:
- attaches the locker,
- extends your "PATH" environment variable to
include /mit/lockername/arch/$ATHENA_SYS/bin or
/mit/lockername/$bindir if /mit/lockername/arch/$ATHENA_SYS/bin
does not exist,
- extends your "MANPATH" environment variable to
include /mit/lockername/man
Thus, if you use "add", you will be able to run programs from the
/mit/locker/arch/$ATHENA_SYS/bin directories, and also access the
manual pages in the locker, both without having to specify the path.
Example:
attach graphics
/mit/graphics/arch/$ATHENA_SYS/bin/xloadimage
man -M/mit/graphics/man xloadimage
or
add graphics
xloadimage
man xloadimage
Some lockers still use the old /mit/lockername/$bindir convention and
other lockers may use both conventions. The
/mit/lockername/arch/$ATHENA_SYS/bin convention is preferred.
You can see that the "add" command makes things much simpler and more
elegant. It also contains several options that may be useful, for
example, when trying to fix dotfiles. For more information, type at the
athena% prompt:
man add
man attach
For more info on the conventions used by lockers type:
man lockers
last updated: 3/6/97
|
