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From: lwall@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV (Larry Wall)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.perl
Subject: Re: %ENV vs. exported environment.
Keywords: %ENV environment bug question
Message-ID: <8658@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV>
Date: 9 Jul 90 23:12:12 GMT
References: <1990Jul7.060454.12400@tc.fluke.COM>
Reply-To: lwall@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV (Larry Wall)
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA
Lines: 31

In article <1990Jul7.060454.12400@tc.fluke.COM> dcd@tc.fluke.COM (David Dyck) writes:
: 
: I have been having unexpected results with %ENV.
: 
: Has anyone else noticed that undef %ENV,
: will undefine %ENV in the perl environment, but it doesn't effect
: the exported environment (to child system processes).
: 
: Adding new values to %ENV will export the new elements
: to sub processes, but the old 'undef'ed values are still
: exported also.
: 
: deleting specific values from %ENV seems to be the same
: as setting that variable to "", instead of removing
: it from the environment.
: 
: Only reset clears the exported environment.
: 
: Is this by design?
: If so, why?

No, it just kinda came out that way.  I'd need to add a little code
to make clearing %ENV work right, and I just haven't done it.  The
reset happens to work because there's code in there to catch it.

Deleting specific values from %ENV is supposed to work (i.e. there's
code there for it), but it got busted when I instituted "undef", I think.

>>Todo.

Larry