nushell/crates/nu-engine/README.md
Leonhard Kipp c42b588782
Refactor nu-cli/env* (#3041)
* Revert "History, more test coverage improvements, and refactorings. (#3217)"

This reverts commit 8fc8fc89aa.

* Add tests

* Refactor .nu-env

* Change logic of Config write to logic of read()

* Fix reload always appends to old vars

* Fix reload always takes last_modified of global config

* Add reload_config in evaluation context

* Reload config after writing to it in cfg set / cfg set_into

* Add --no-history to cli options

* Use --no-history in tests

* Add comment about maybe_print_errors

* Get ctrl_exit var from context.global_config

* Use context.global_config in command "config"

* Add Readme in engine how env vars are now handled

* Update docs from autoenv command

* Move history_path from engine to nu_data

* Move load history out of if

* No let before return

* Add import for indexmap
2021-03-31 18:52:34 +13:00

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Markdown

# Nu-Engine
Nu-engine handles most of the core logic of nushell. For example, engine handles:
- Passing of data between commands
- Evaluating a commands return values
- Loading of user configurations
## Top level introduction
The following topics shall give the reader a top level understanding how various topics are handled in nushell.
### How are environment variables handled?
Environment variables (or short envs) are stored in the `Scope` of the `EvaluationContext`. That means that environment variables are scoped by default and we don't use `std::env` to store envs (but make exceptions where convenient).
Nushell handles environment variables and their lifetime the following:
- At startup all existing environment variables are read and put into `Scope`. (Nushell reads existing environment variables platform independent by asking the `Host`. They will most likly come from `std::env::*`)
- Envs can also be loaded from config files. Each loaded config produces a new `ScopeFrame` with the envs of the loaded config.
- Nu-Script files and internal commands read and write env variables from / to the `Scope`. External scripts and binaries can't interact with the `Scope`. Therefore all env variables are read from the `Scope` and put into the external binaries environment-variables-memory area.