Setting Environment Variables for Mercurial Hook

Answer 1

Shell scripts can't modify their enviroment.

http://tldp.org/LDP/abs/html/gotchas.html

A script may not export variables back to its parent process, the shell, or to the environment. Just as we learned in biology, a child process can inherit from a parent, but not vice versa

$ cat > eg.sh 
export FOO="bar";
^D
$ bash eg.sh 
$ echo $FOO; 

$

also, the problem is greater, as you have multiple calls of bash

bash 1 -> hg -> bash 2 ( shell script ) 
             -> bash 3 ( env call )

it would be like thinking I could set a variable in one php script and then magically get it with another simply by running one after the other.

Answer 2

okay, so calling 'export VARIABLE' in a shell script makes that available to the current running shell process though, correct?