After changing /etc/profile, what do I have to do to reset my shell?

Question

To test its effects immediately instead of having to reload the terminal

Answer 1

use source /etc/profile

for details, man source or you can checkout this link http://bash.cyberciti.biz/guide/Source_command

Answer 2

As sjr says, you can approximate the effect of the change by re-reading /etc/profile using the dot . (or, in Bash, source) command.

However, you need to be aware that /etc/profile gets to work with a more minimal starting environment, so the effect you get by rereading the profile is not necessarily identical to the effect you get on login. You can simulate the original environment more accurately using the env command to unset the environment. With bash, you can use the -l option to make the shell behave more like a login shell - in conjunction with env, you can simulate the login environment accurately:

env -i HOME=$HOME PATH=/bin:/usr/bin USER=$USER ... bash -l

Answer 3

If this is bash you can do . /etc/profile, it's the same as doing source /etc/profile.