Bug 41213 – bash profile (skel) should export more things by default like COLUMNS and LINES

• Product: Gentoo Linux
• Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX

[Description Aaron Peterson 2004-02-11 01:16:58 UTC]

I've been trying to figure out how to make this simple shell script work:
#!/bin/bash
echo $COLUMNS

apperantly, the way to do this is to say COLUMNS=$COLUMNS cow.sh
or export $COLUMNS  cow.sh

but the other way is it have these imporant enviorment variables exported by default

Reproducible: Didn't try
Steps to Reproduce:
1.
2.
3.

[Comment 1 SpanKY 2004-02-11 18:29:19 UTC]

i dont have COLUMNS defined anywhere in my files yet that var works when i start a new bash

what shell do you use ?

[Comment 2 Aaron Peterson 2004-02-11 21:44:10 UTC]

bash-2.05b$ whoami
aaron
bash-2.05b$ bash --version
GNU bash, version 2.05b.0(1)-release (i686-pc-linux-gnu)
Copyright (C) 2002 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
bash-2.05b$ cat cow2.sh
#!/bin/bash
#shopt -s checkwinsize
#kill -n 28 $$
echo $COLUMNS
bash-2.05b$ ./cow2.sh

bash-2.05b$ . cow2.sh
71
bash-2.05b$ COLUMNS=$COLUMNS ./cow2.sh
71
bash-2.05b$

[Comment 3 SpanKY 2004-02-11 21:54:40 UTC]

from bash(1):
       COLUMNS
              Used by the select builtin command  to  determine  the  terminal
              width  when  printing  selection  lists.  Automatically set upon
              receipt of a SIGWINCH.
from signals(7):
       SIGWINCH    28,28,20    Ign     Window resize signal (4.3 BSD, Sun)

if you want access to that kind of information in scripts i'd suggest you utilize `stty size`