Applications (like RV) can make use of environment variables in various ways. It is a bit of a mystery for many Mac users how to create environment variables that will be available for all applications, including those launched from icons, etc. If you are using Windows, please see.

1. Xp Environment Variables
2. Environment Variables Unix

The process involves creating (or editing, if it exists) a special environment.plist file in the users home directory. You can add the environment variable and it's value here. Then you have to log out and in. Hi all, I'm a bit late to the party here, and knowing Apple this will probably change again next OS, but currently the only always-working-for-sure way to get environment variables to show up in Finder-launched, Terminal-launched, and Spotlight-launched applications (as of High Sierra, OS 10.13) that I know of, is to set a launchctl script as a login item: Wonky af, I know, but this is the only thing that has worked for me in all scenarios. I have no idea why Apple insists on making their OS less user-friendly with each iteration, but this is currently working.

Xp Environment Variables

I took a long time reading tons of forums and trying all the other methods before figuring this out. Hope it can save someone else the headache! -Chris Burgess.

$HIP/vex $HFS/houdini/vex $HOME/houdini/vex = Equivalent to $HIP: the path of the directory containing the current scene file. & The 'default' path for the given variable. For example, to add a directory '/mypath' to the default path for a variable, use '/mypath;&;'. This will search '/mypath' path first, then the directories on the default path. ^ For VEX-related variables, expands to the shader type (e.g. Surface, Displacement, Sop, etc.).

Environment Variables Unix

For example, if HOUDINIVEXPATH is '$HOME/vex/^', when loading Surface shaders it will expand to '$HOME/vex/Surface'.