If you made a change to your .profile why wouldn't you just apply it? . ~/.profile Why logout and back in? You know which file was changed because you ma

If you made a change to your .profile why wouldn't you just apply it? . ~/.profile Why logout and back in? You know which file was changed because you made the change. As someone else mentioned down below, if you just need a new login shell with your variable changes just do this: exec /bin/bash -l (the -l meaning, "act as if... invoked as a login shell") Also a tip if you're using KDE: You don't need to logout and back in. Just do this: killall plasmashell kstart plasmashell That should apply any changes you've made to environment variables to any applications that get launched (subsequently) via KDE's usual methods (e.g. K menu or krunnner aka Alt-F2). Your running applications will remain open!