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Date: Sat, 23 Feb 2013 09:24:32 +1000
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Subject: Re: $USER is not resolved in paths sometimes
In-reply-to: Your message of Fri, 22 Feb 2013 22:53:30 +0100	 <kg8pct$bnq$1@ger.gmane.org>
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I agree with Achim.  Don't use Microsoft Windows paths.
Cygwin has a function called cygpath which is very handy to use to convert paths and use in zsh and other shell scripts

In zsh, using zsh syntax, I use it like this:

Convert the first argument to a micrsoft window format pathname
   winpath=$(cygpath -w $1)

or to convert a Windows formatted pathname to unix like do:
    fname=$(cygpath -w ${windows-type-ifname})
		 
a hardcoded filename would be
    fname=$(cygpath -w ${C:\miscrosoft\windows-type-ifname.abc})

* you may need to quote the flename to escape : or \....



Thomas Deinhamer <thasmo AT gmail DOT com> wrote:
>....
> I'm new to Cygwin, new to this newsgroup too. ;)
> 
> I'm running Cygwin and using the zsh shell.
> 
> In the .zshrc file I got these lines:
> alias vboxmanage=VBoxManage
> vboxmanage setproperty machinefolder "C:\Users\$USER\VirtualBox VMs\"
> 
> When I try to boot a VM using vagrant (which
> uses vboxmanage internally I think) sometimes
> $USER is not resolved to the real username.
> 
> Instead vboxmanage creates a new machinefolder
> on C:/ which is then called "Users$USER" and
> inside this folder there is the folder "VirtualBox VMs",
> so the wrong path is "C:\Users$USER\VirtualBox VMs\".
> 
> How could that be? Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.
> 
> Do I need to escape the backslashes or is
> there anything else I need to take care of?
> 
> I'm wondering why it only fails sometimes.
> 
> Thanks a lot,
> Thomas

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