override PATH variable in `env:` #449

ivotron · 2021-03-10T06:01:59Z

ivotron
Mar 10, 2021

I would like to redefine PATH in env:, so that I can append paths that are given in vars: as well as .env files. However, given the following:

version: '3'

env:
  PATH: "/some/path/bin:{{.PATH}}"
  OTHER: "/some/path/bin:{{.PATH}}"

tasks:
  test:
  - echo $PATH
  - echo $OTHER

and an initial value of PATH=/usr/bin:/usr/local/bin, I get the following:

$ task test
task: echo $PATH
/usr/bin:/usr/local/bin
task: echo $OTHER
/some/bin:/some/bin:/usr/bin:/usr/local/bin

I've tried distinct alternatives such as defining a variable first, then assigning this variables to PATH in env:, and also doing sh: "echo ...", but nothing seems to work.

I also noticed that this behavior applies to any pre-existing environment variable. Is there a limitation with respect to overriding existing variables? If so, do you have a workaround for this? I would like to avoid having to override PATH inside the bash script itself every time that this is needed.

If this is something that can be fixed, I can volunteer to send a PR for this, but I'd like to kindly ask for your guidance with high-level instructions on how to go about implementing something like this (I'm new to Task in general, so I'm not familiar with the codebase).

thanks a lot for your time!