Returns a string that contains the value of the desired environment variable in the environment in which the ABL session is running.

Syntax

OS-GETENV ( environment-variable )
environment-variable
The name of the environment variable whose value you want to find.

Example

This procedure prompts a user for a report name. It then builds the full pathname where the report will be stored, using OS-GETENV to find the DLC directory. Finally, the procedure displays the full pathname.

r-os-env.p 

DEFINE VARIABLE pathname    AS CHARACTER NO-UNDO FORMAT "x(32)"
  LABEL "The report will be stored in ".
DEFINE VARIABLE report_name AS CHARACTER NO-UNDO FORMAT "x(32)"
  LABEL "Please enter report name." .

UPDATE report_name.
pathname = OS-GETENV("DLC") + "/" + report_name.
DISPLAY pathname WITH FRAME b SIDE-LABELS.

Notes

  • If the environment variable is not defined, this statement returns the Unknown value (?).
  • This function returns the value of an environment variable defined before the ABL session started, not a variable defined during the session.
  • Since environment variables are case sensitive in some environments, make sure that the name you supply is the correct case.
  • For security reasons some operating systems may not return certain system environment variable values. In these cases the Unknown value (?) is returned.
  • When the AVM retrieves an environment variable from the operating system, it assumes that the value is encoded using the same encoding as the internal code page setting (-cpinternal). No conversion is done when reading the value into the AVM's memory. The application may need to use the CODEPAGE-CONVERT function to convert the value from the operating system encoding to the session encoding if it is not already in a compatible format.

    The Wide Character Convert (-widecharconv) startup parameter can be used to modify the behavior of OS-GETENV on Windows. Use -widecharconv when there are extended characters in environment variables that need to be accessed by an application. Do not use, however, if the application uses CODEPAGE-CONVERT to convert environment variable; doing so will cause an extra conversion that may produce incorrect output.