Environment Variables via properties file in bash

envByProperties.md

Environment variables can be loaded from a properties file in bash

testenv.properties

foo=alpha
bar=beta

This will work because input redirection happens in the current shell.

while read line; do
    export $line
done < testenv.properties 

This will not work because piping happens in a subshell.

cat testenv.properties | while read line; do
    export $line
done

Of course, you could also make it easy for yourself by exporting the properties directly (now testenv.sh):

export foo=alpha
export bar=beta

And inject into the current shell using

source testenv.sh

Unfortunately you can't do stuff like this

export testenv.properties   # If only...
cat testenv.properties | xargs export   # Would have also been nice...

You can by with the command
. file.properties
it works

can by with the command

Not working for me. I am running inside WSL2 (Ubuntu 20.x)

If your properties file only contains properties and nothing else, this syntax works:

export $( cat testenv.properties | xargs )

Figured, this works on bash:

export `cat testenv.properties`