How do I automate the setting of Cypress environment variables on a windows machine via a text file?

Question

On Unix and Mac machines, environmental variables can be read from .env files which have 'export' commands in them.

For example:

export USER_ENV=test
export CLIENT=company

In windows, there's no such thing as the 'export' command. I therefore use the 'set' command to set the environmental variables.

set USER_ENV=test
set CLIENT=company

The problem is that I have to enter each and every line individually on the command prompt.
Is there anyway I can run these 'set' commands to set the variables from a single test file?

This would save me the need to run each command individually from CMD.

I tried by entering the commands in a file setenv.txt and used the following command:

cmd < setenv.txt

That did not work as intended. I saw errors while trying to start Cypress.

How can I run these commands from a file via the CMD terminal in Windows?

Answer 1

You can create a batch file where you set all your environment variables.

A batch file in Windows is just a text file with .bat extension, it could look like this:

@ECHO OFF

:: Assign all Path variables
SET TEST="some env value"

Then you execute it from the cmd:

C:\Users\PavelSaman\Desktop>echo %TEST%
%TEST%

C:\Users\PavelSaman\Desktop>env.bat

C:\Users\PavelSaman\Desktop>echo %TEST%
"some env value"

and you've set up what you previously did command by command.

You can also set a system environment variable via setx command with /m parameter:

:: add system environment variable (you need admin rights for this)
setx TEST2 "system environment" /m

You can find more here: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/21606419/set-windows-environment-variables-with-a-batch-file or here: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/administration/windows-commands/setx