How to export and import environment variables in windows(e.g. XP)?

Question

I found it is hard to keep my environment variables sync on different machines. I just want to export the settings from one computer and import to other ones.

I think it should be possible, but don't know how to do it. Can anyone help me? Thanks.

Answer 1

You can use RegEdit to export the following two keys:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Environment HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Environment

The first set are system/global environment variables; the second set are user-level variables. Edit as needed and then import the .reg files on the new machine.

Answer 2

You can get access to the environment variables in either the command line or in the registry.

Command Line

If you want a specific environment variable, then just type the name of it (e.g. PATH), followed by a '>' and the filename to write to. The following will dump the PATH environment variable to a file named path.txt.

C:\> PATH > path.txt

Registry Method

The Windows Registry holds all the environment variables, in different places depending on which set you are after. You can use the registry Import/Export commands to shift them into the other PC.

For System Variables:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Environment

For User Variables:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Environment