..
   Copyright Spack Project Developers. See COPYRIGHT file for details.

   SPDX-License-Identifier: (Apache-2.0 OR MIT)

.. meta::
   :description lang=en:
      Learn how to modify shell environment variables within a Spack environment using the env_vars.yaml file.

.. _env-vars-yaml:

Environment Variable Settings (env_vars.yaml)
=============================================

Spack allows you to include shell environment variable modifications for a Spack environment by including an ``env_vars.yaml`` file.
Environment variables can be modified by setting, unsetting, appending, and prepending variables in the shell environment.
The changes to the shell environment will take effect when the Spack environment is activated.

For example:

.. code-block:: yaml

  env_vars:
    set:
      ENVAR_TO_SET_IN_ENV_LOAD: "FOO"
    unset:
    - ENVAR_TO_UNSET_IN_ENV_LOAD
    prepend_path:
      PATH_LIST: "path/to/prepend"
    append_path:
      PATH_LIST: "path/to/append"
    remove_path:
      PATH_LIST: "path/to/remove"