An unset variable in path: puts the working directory on PATH

Open Beginner friendly
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Assessment

Difficulty
2/5
Estimated time
1-3 hours
Newbie friendliness
75/100
Issue type
Bug
Clarity
Clearly specified
Activity status
Active
Tech stack
typescript
Domain
cli, testing-qa

Research direction

Locate the code that expands path: entries and inspect how unset variables become PATH elements. Add the proposed test using a bare $VAR, then verify that an empty expansion is omitted and the working directory is not searched; the test should produce a clear command-not-found result.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Description

An unset variable in a path: entry expands to an empty string, and an empty PATH
element means the current directory to POSIX. So this front matter:

path:
  - $TOOL_DIR

silently puts the working directory on PATH when TOOL_DIR is not set, instead of
contributing nothing.

That is the wrong failure. A test that names a directory it cannot resolve should get a
clear "command not found", not a lookup that quietly searches somewhere the author never
named — and in a sandboxed run the working directory contains fixtures, which is exactly
where a stray executable could sit.

Proposal

Drop entries that expand to empty, rather than passing them through.

A test asserting that a bare $VAR does not put the working directory on PATH would pin
it: today that assertion fails.

Related

jlevy/tryscript#54 asks for requires:, which addresses the same underlying problem from
the other side — knowing which binary a run actually resolved rather than trusting PATH
composition to have gone as intended.

Dominant language
TypeScript
Stars
13
Forks
1
Avg merge
3h 38m
Merged PRs (30d)
3

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