Mailing-List: contact cygwin-help AT cygwin DOT com; run by ezmlm
List-Subscribe: <mailto:cygwin-subscribe AT cygwin DOT com>
List-Archive: <http://sourceware.org/ml/cygwin/>
List-Post: <mailto:cygwin AT cygwin DOT com>
List-Help: <mailto:cygwin-help AT cygwin DOT com>, <http://sourceware.org/ml/#faqs>
Sender: cygwin-owner AT cygwin DOT com
Mail-Followup-To: cygwin AT cygwin DOT com
Delivered-To: mailing list cygwin AT cygwin DOT com
Reply-To: Cygwin List <cygwin AT cygwin DOT com>
Message-Id: <6.2.1.2.0.20050501160831.03a26eb0@pop.prospeed.net>
Date: Sun, 01 May 2005 16:58:29 -0400
To: cygwin AT cygwin DOT com
From: Larry Hall <lh-no-personal-replies-please AT cygwin DOT com>
Subject: Re: SSH Path Bug
In-Reply-To: <20050501095519.GA25694@calimero.vinschen.de>
References: <AAE27702C6ACD84FA3BB03D6C04C2B67B5F6 AT swebtec-exchang DOT Swebtec DOT com> <4272E677 DOT CB0D7E3A AT dessent DOT net> <6 DOT 2 DOT 1 DOT 2 DOT 0 DOT 20050430144713 DOT 089d60f8 AT pop DOT prospeed DOT net> <20050501095519 DOT GA25694 AT calimero DOT vinschen DOT de>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

At 05:55 AM 5/1/2005, you wrote:
>On Apr 30 14:53, Larry Hall wrote:
>> At 09:59 PM 4/29/2005, you wrote:
>> >Dominic Chambers wrote:
>> >
>> >> Running commands via SSH causes windows executables to be given path
>> >> priority, so that they run ahead of identically named UNIX executables. I
>> >> found this while trying to use the find command as part of an SSH call.
>> >> For example, assuming you have an SSH server set up:
>> >
>> >I would think this has more to do with how you set your path than
>> >anything else.  [...]
>> 
>> No, it's not that.  I was able to reproduce the described behavior even 
>> when my system path has Cygwin's bin path before Windows.
>
>Sounds more like a cockpit error.  I just tried it and I can't reproduce it.


Yeah, it looks like I must have been caught by Windows' insufferable need
to be rebooted after almost any change.  Why am I surprised? ;-)


>> Running 'sshd'
>> in debug mode showed the imported path that was not an exact match to any
>> path I'd set anywhere.  So far, I haven't been able to get far enough 
>> that I know why this happens.  But I can say that it happens for me
>> and on more than 1 system and O/S.

I should have said "Windows O/S" here.  Specifically, I tried it on W2K and
XP.

>It's not a bug, it's a feature :-)
>
>What happens is a combination of what's done in cygrunsrv and sshd.
>
>First, cygrunsrv adds the path to /bin to the environment before starting
>a child process.  But it *appends* /bin to the path, so that the order
>of path evaluation isn't changed.  So that can be taken out of the equation.
>
>And what does sshd?  Sshd is equivalent to a login process, so on non-Cygwin
>systems, it has to set the PATH variable to the default path value for the
>system.  Usually something like PATH="/usr/bin:/bin".
>
>On Windows it's a bit different because the PATH variable given to service
>process (== the system environment) already contains paths, which are
>required to run any process on Windows.  So the PATH variable must not be
>replaced by default paths as on other systems.  Consequentially, Cygwin-sshd
>does not change $PATH at all, but uses the default PATH as it is set in the
>Windows system environment.  This is, IMHO, the equivalent to the default
>PATH on other systems.
>
>What you can do: 
>
>- Prepend Cygwin paths to your system environment and restart(!) the PC.


As I said above, UGH! ;-)


>- Set the default PATH only for your sshd service, for instance
>
>    cygrunsrv -I sshd -d "CYGWIN sshd" -p /usr/sbin/sshd -a -D \
>              -e "PATH=/usr/bin:/bin:/cygdrive/c/WINDOWS/system32:/cygdrive/c/WINDOWS:/cygdrive/c/WINDOWS/System32/Wbem"
>
>  assuming your Windows is installed in C:\Windows


Yeah, this is probably the nicest from the user point of view.


>- Even better: Always use absolute paths when running remote applications.


Yep.  That certainly works and is the most portable. :-)

Thanks.


--
Larry Hall                              http://www.rfk.com
RFK Partners, Inc.                      (508) 893-9779 - RFK Office
838 Washington Street                   (508) 893-9889 - FAX
Holliston, MA 01746                     


--
Unsubscribe info:      http://cygwin.com/ml/#unsubscribe-simple
Problem reports:       http://cygwin.com/problems.html
Documentation:         http://cygwin.com/docs.html
FAQ:                   http://cygwin.com/faq/