Using a command such as "echo %CLASSPATH%" in the cmd window returns ".;%JAVA_HOME%\lib\dt.jar;%JAVA_HOME%\lib\tools.;" instead of ".;C:\Program Files\Java\jdk-17.0.5\lib\dt.jar;C:\Program Files\Java\jdk-17.0.5\lib\tools.jar;" However, if you use the command "echo %JAVA_HOME%", it returns "C:\Program Files\Java\jdk-17" Some of these environment variables can be parsed, while in some situations they cannot be parsed, which bothers me, hoping to receive a suitable solution. Version: Windows11 professional workstation 23H2 22635.2700 Windows Feature Experience Pack 1000.22678.1000.0

call echo %CLASSPATH% will expand the inner variables similarly: call set "Expanded=%CLASSPATH%"

Windows environment variables cannot be parsed correctly

Accepted answer

MotoX80 33,296

The registry entries for the variables should be REG_EXPAND_SZ and not REG_SZ.

System: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Environment

User: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Environment

You may have to delete and recreate the variable. If it's a system variable, a reboot will probably be needed to pick up the change.

User's image

JocuperDARY 20 Reputation points

2023-11-17T18:40:38.4533333+00:00

It did work on cmd for the first time since I recreated it, but when I opened cmd for the second time, it just happened again. This might be a bug on windows.
MotoX80 33,296 Reputation points

2023-11-17T19:44:29.0266667+00:00
Are you running some .bat/.cmd file to launch some Java process? It may try to set the variables and may not be correct.

Which variable did you recreate? Was it in HKEY_CURRENT_USER or HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM? Did it change from REG_EXPAND_SZ back to REG_SZ?

If you open up another cmd prompt window, does it show the same problem?

You can query the entries from a command line like this.

reg.exe query "HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Environment" reg.exe query "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Environment"

JocuperDARY 20

No, I did not run any .bat/.cmd file. Actually I recreated all the varibles that contained "%xxx%", but each of them originally was REG_EXPAND_SZ, which made me confused.

The following is the result it returned after using the command:
reg.exe query "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Environment"

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Environment
    ACSetupSvcPort    REG_SZ    23210
    ACSvcPort    REG_SZ    17532
    AMDRMPATH    REG_SZ    C:\Program Files\AMD\RyzenMaster\
    ChocolateyInstall    REG_SZ    C:\ProgramData\chocolatey
    CLASSPATH    REG_EXPAND_SZ    .;%JAVA_HOME%\lib\dt.jar;%JAVA_HOME%\lib\tools.jar;
    ComSpec    REG_EXPAND_SZ    %SystemRoot%\system32\cmd.exe
    CUDA_BIN_PATH    REG_EXPAND_SZ    %CUDA_PATH%\bin
    CUDA_LIB_PATH    REG_EXPAND_SZ    %CUDA_PATH%\lib\x64
    CUDA_MODULE_LOADING    REG_SZ    LAZY
    CUDA_PATH    REG_EXPAND_SZ    %CUDA_PATH_V11_8%
    CUDA_PATH_V11_6    REG_SZ    C:\Program Files\NVIDIA GPU Computing Toolkit\CUDA\v11.6
    CUDA_PATH_V11_8    REG_SZ    C:\Program Files\NVIDIA GPU Computing Toolkit\CUDA\v11.8
    CUDA_PATH_V12_2    REG_SZ    C:\Program Files\NVIDIA GPU Computing Toolkit\CUDA\v12.2
    CUDA_SDK_BIN_PATH    REG_EXPAND_SZ    %CUDA_SDK_PATH%\bin\Win64\Release
    CUDA_SDK_LIB_PATH    REG_EXPAND_SZ    %CUDA_SDK_PATH%\common\lib\x64
    CUDA_SDK_PATH    REG_EXPAND_SZ    %CUDA_PATH%\cuda-samples
    DriverData    REG_SZ    C:\Windows\System32\Drivers\DriverData
    EXPAND_PATH    REG_EXPAND_SZ    %CUDA_SDK_BIN_PATH%;%CUDA_LIB_PATH%;%CUDA_BIN_PATH%;%CUDA_PATH%\lib;%CUDA_SDK_LIB_PATH%;%CUDA_PATH%\libnvvp;%JRE_HOME%;%JAVA_HOME%\bin;%JAVA_HOME%\jre\bin;
    GameFirst    REG_SZ    C:\Program Files (x86)\ASUS\GameFirst\
    GameFirstUserPath    REG_SZ    C:\Users\ljp37\AppData\Local\ASUS\GameFirst
    JAVA_HOME    REG_EXPAND_SZ    %JAVA_HOME_17%
    JAVA_HOME_11    REG_SZ    C:\Program Files\Java\jdk-11
    JAVA_HOME_17    REG_SZ    C:\Program Files\Java\jdk-17
    JAVA_HOME_19    REG_SZ    C:\Program Files\Java\jdk-19
    JAVA_HOME_21    REG_SZ    C:\Program Files\Java\jdk-21
    JAVA_HOME_8    REG_SZ    C:\Program Files\Java\jdk1.8.0_361
    JAVA_HOME_Adopt_9    REG_SZ    C:\Program Files\AdoptOpenJDK\jdk-8.0.292.10-openj9
    JAVA_HOME_Eclipse_8    REG_SZ    C:\Program Files\Eclipse Foundation\jdk-8.0.302.8-hotspot
    JAVA_HOME_Microsoft_11.0.12.7    REG_SZ    C:\Program Files\Microsoft\jdk-11.0.12.7-hotspot
    JAVA_HOME_Microsoft_11.0.18.10    REG_SZ    C:\Program Files\Microsoft\jdk-11.0.18.10-hotspot
    JRE_HOME    REG_EXPAND_SZ    %JAVA_HOME_Adopt_9%\jre
    NUMBER_OF_PROCESSORS    REG_SZ    128
    NVTOOLSEXT_PATH    REG_SZ    C:\Program Files\NVIDIA Corporation\NvToolsExt\
    OS    REG_SZ    Windows_NT
    Path    REG_EXPAND_SZ    C:\Program Files\Razer\ChromaBroadcast\bin;C:\Program Files (x86)\Razer\ChromaBroadcast\bin;%EXPAND_PATH%;C:\jdk_switch;C:\Program Files\Git\mingw64\bin;C:\Program Files (x86)\dotnet;C:\Program Files\nodejs\;C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\130\Tools\Binn\;C:\Program Files\NVIDIA Corporation\Nsight Compute 2022.3.0\;C:\Python311;%SystemRoot%\system32;%SystemRoot%\;%SystemRoot%\System32\Wbem;%SystemRoot%\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\;%SystemRoot%\System32\OpenSSH\;C:\FFMPEG\bin;C:\Program Files\Docker\Docker\resources\bin;C:\Handle;C:\Program Files (x86)\Incredibuild;C:\Program Files\Git\cmd;C:\Program Files\Git\usr\bin;C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\Client SDK\ODBC\170\Tools\Binn\;C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\150\Tools\Binn\;C:\WINDOWS\system32\config\systemprofile\AppData\Local\Microsoft\WindowsApps;C:\Program Files (x86)\Razer Chroma SDK\bin;C:\Program Files\Razer Chroma SDK\bin;C:\Program Files\Bandizip\;C:\Program Files (x86)\NVIDIA Corporation\PhysX\Common;C:\Program Files\NVIDIA Corporation\NVIDIA NvDLISR;C:\Users\ljp37\AppData\Local\Microsoft\WindowsApps;C:\Users\ljp37\AppData\Roaming\npm;C:\WINDOWS\system32;C:\WINDOWS;C:\WINDOWS\System32\Wbem;C:\WINDOWS\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\;C:\WINDOWS\System32\OpenSSH\;C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\Windows Performance Toolkit\;C:\Program Files\dotnet\;
    PATHEXT    REG_SZ    .COM;.EXE;.BAT;.CMD;.VBS;.VBE;.JS;.JSE;.WSF;.WSH;.MSC;.PY;.PYW
    PROCESSOR_ARCHITECTURE    REG_SZ    AMD64
    PROCESSOR_IDENTIFIER    REG_SZ    AMD64 Family 23 Model 49 Stepping 0, AuthenticAMD
    PROCESSOR_LEVEL    REG_SZ    23
    PROCESSOR_REVISION    REG_SZ    3100
    PSModulePath    REG_EXPAND_SZ    %ProgramFiles%\WindowsPowerShell\Modules;%SystemRoot%\system32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\Modules;
    RlsSvcPort    REG_SZ    22112
    TEMP    REG_EXPAND_SZ    %SystemRoot%\TEMP
    TMP    REG_EXPAND_SZ    %SystemRoot%\TEMP
    USERNAME    REG_SZ    SYSTEM
    VS140COMNTOOLS    REG_SZ    C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 14.0\Common7\Tools\
    windir    REG_EXPAND_SZ    %SystemRoot%

While this is what it looks like when using echo %Path% in cmd

C:\Program Files\Razer\ChromaBroadcast\bin;C:\Program Files (x86)\Razer\ChromaBroadcast\bin;C:\Program Files\NVIDIA GPU Computing Toolkit\CUDA\v11.8\cuda-samples\bin\Win64\Release;C:\Program Files\NVIDIA GPU Computing Toolkit\CUDA\v11.8\lib\x64;C:\Program Files\NVIDIA GPU Computing Toolkit\CUDA\v11.8\bin;C:\Program Files\NVIDIA GPU Computing Toolkit\CUDA\v11.8\lib;C:\Program Files\NVIDIA GPU Computing Toolkit\CUDA\v11.8\cuda-samples\common\lib\x64;C:\Program Files\NVIDIA GPU Computing Toolkit\CUDA\v11.8\libnvvp;%JRE_HOME%;%JAVA_HOME%\bin;%JAVA_HOME%\jre\bin;;C:\jdk_switch;C:\Program Files\Git\mingw64\bin;C:\Program Files (x86)\dotnet;C:\Program Files\nodejs\;C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\130\Tools\Binn\;C:\Program Files\NVIDIA Corporation\Nsight Compute 2022.3.0\;C:\Python311;C:\WINDOWS\system32;C:\WINDOWS\;C:\WINDOWS\System32\Wbem;C:\WINDOWS\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\;C:\WINDOWS\System32\OpenSSH\;C:\FFMPEG\bin;C:\Program Files\Docker\Docker\resources\bin;C:\Handle;C:\Program Files (x86)\Incredibuild;C:\Program Files\Git\cmd;C:\Program Files\Git\usr\bin;C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\Client SDK\ODBC\170\Tools\Binn\;C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\150\Tools\Binn\;C:\WINDOWS\system32\config\systemprofile\AppData\Local\Microsoft\WindowsApps;C:\Program Files (x86)\Razer Chroma SDK\bin;C:\Program Files\Razer Chroma SDK\bin;C:\Program Files\Bandizip\;C:\Program Files (x86)\NVIDIA Corporation\PhysX\Common;C:\Program Files\NVIDIA Corporation\NVIDIA NvDLISR;C:\Users\ljp37\AppData\Local\Microsoft\WindowsApps;C:\Users\ljp37\AppData\Roaming\npm;C:\WINDOWS\system32;C:\WINDOWS;C:\WINDOWS\System32\Wbem;C:\WINDOWS\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\;C:\WINDOWS\System32\OpenSSH\;C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\Windows Performance Toolkit\;C:\Program Files\dotnet\;C:\Users\ljp37\AppData\Local\Microsoft\WindowsApps;;C:\Users\ljp37\AppData\Roaming\npm;C:\Users\ljp37\AppData\Local\Programs\Microsoft VS Code\bin;C:\Program Files\JetBrains\IntelliJ IDEA Community Edition 2023.2.4\bin;;C:\Program Files\JetBrains\PyCharm Community Edition 2023.2.4\bin;;C:\Users\ljp37\.dotnet\tools

JocuperDARY 20 Reputation points

2023-11-18T04:17:54.41+00:00

What puzzles me even more is the following:

echo %EXPAND_PATH%

%CUDA_SDK_PATH%\bin\Win64\Release;%CUDA_PATH%\lib\x64;%CUDA_PATH%\bin;C:\Program Files\NVIDIA GPU Computing Toolkit\CUDA\v11.8\lib;%CUDA_SDK_PATH%\common\lib\x64;C:\Program Files\NVIDIA GPU Computing Toolkit\CUDA\v11.8\libnvvp;%JRE_HOME%;%JAVA_HOME%\bin;%JAVA_HOME%\jre\bin;
JocuperDARY 20 Reputation points

2023-11-18T04:19:28.18+00:00

I don't even know how could this happen.
MotoX80 33,296 Reputation points

2023-11-18T22:55:13.4933333+00:00
So I was playing around and I managed to recreate a situation that looks similar to your issue.

The problem is that I don't know how I did this. My theory was that the problem was related to the alphabetical order of the variable names. This image seemed to support that since the ZZZZ variable was correct but the AAAA one had 2 variables that did not get expanded.

So I next wanted to document the exact commands that created this. I deleted all of my test variables and rebooted to start clean.

Then I opened a Powershell prompt with "run as admin" so that I could update the registry. Powershell won't expand %variable-names% too.

I ran this.

reg.exe add 'HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Environment' /v CUDA_AAAA /t REG_EXPAND_SZ /d '%CUDA_PATH_Test%\AAAA' /f reg.exe add 'HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Environment' /v CUDA_PATH_TEST /t REG_SZ /d 'C:\Temp\CUDA' /f reg.exe add 'HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Environment' /v CUDA_ZZZZ /t REG_EXPAND_SZ /d '%CUDA_PATH_TEST%\ZZZZ' /f reg.exe add 'HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Environment' /v ZZZZ_EXPAND_PATH_TEST /t REG_EXPAND_SZ /d '%CUDA_AAAA%;%CUDA_PATH_TEST%;%CUDA_ZZZZ%' /f reg.exe add 'HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Environment' /v AAAA_EXPAND_PATH_TEST /t REG_EXPAND_SZ /d '%CUDA_AAAA%;%CUDA_PATH_TEST%;%CUDA_ZZZZ%' /f

I did not reboot but just opened a command prompt. I found that cmd opened with "run as admin" could see the variables, but a "normal" cmd prompt did not.

That's when I noticed that my "recreation" was using a "normal" and not an elevated cmd prompt.

After I rebooted, the variables were then visible.

So..... when you "echo %EXPAND_PATH%", are you doing that from a "run as administrator" command prompt?

Is there a .bat file in the startup folder or in the Task Scheduler that recreates or defines any of these variables?
JocuperDARY 20 Reputation points

2023-11-28T13:04:34.0566667+00:00

Thanks for your patient answer!

Yes, I did "echo %EXPAND_PATH%" from a "run as administrator" command prompt, but it gave me wrong varibles.

Then I recreated the "REG_EXPAND_SZ" varibles one by one.

It did show the correct varibles when I opened the cmd by using Powershell prompt with "run as admin" while it did not work when open cmd by using Win + R. And then I rebooted, the variables were then visible as well.

After that I thought the key of this problem might be the creation order of the variables. If a variable points to another variable that has not yet been created, it may not be resolved.

By the way, there are some .bat files in the startup folder that recreates some of these variables, because there are mutiple JAVA and CUDA environments deployed on this PC for different usage scenarios. So I created the .bat files and run them as Admin to edit the varibles such as JAVA_HOME and CUDA_HOME. Is this what causes the exception?
MotoX80 33,296 Reputation points

2023-11-28T13:32:45.2466667+00:00

Can you post one of those bat files? Probably have to save it as a .txt file.

JocuperDARY 20

set /P choose=enter your choice:
IF "%choose%" == "8" (
    setx "JAVA_HOME" "%%JAVA_HOME_8%%" /m

) ELSE IF "%choose%" == "11" (
    setx "JAVA_HOME" "%%JAVA_HOME_11%%" /m

) ELSE IF "%choose%" == "17" (
    setx "JAVA_HOME" "%%JAVA_HOME_17%%" /m

) ELSE IF "%choose%" == "19" (
    setx "JAVA_HOME" "%%JAVA_HOME_19%%" /m
)
pause

MotoX80 33,296 Reputation points

2023-12-02T19:36:27.0466667+00:00

Your bat file appears to work fine.

The issue seems to be that when you change the contents of a variable, Windows only updates variables that directly reference that variable name.

Here I defined 3 variables that reference each other. I set XXXX3 to a string, "This is 3.". After a reboot, all variables contained the same data.

Then I changed 3's value to "This is 3. Test 2.". Windows updated XXXX2, presumably because it directly referenced the XXXX3 variable, but not XXXX1 because it only referenced XXXX2.

My recommendation to you would be to get rid of the EXPAND_PATH variable. Put Java_Home (and other "bin" folders) in the PATH variable. The variable nesting does not appear to recurse through all variables when you change something. And while I was playing around, one time even the reboot did not resolve everything. Try to minimize the nesting.

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Windows environment variables cannot be parsed correctly

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