Environment Variables

It is crucial to the operation of SAP® products that the system environment variables are set correctly. The installer sets the environment variables automatically at the system level.

As part of the installation, the installer sets up these environment variables:

  • DSLISTEN – defines the name SAP ASE uses to listen for client connections if no name is provided during the SAP ASE start-up. If DSLISTEN is not set, and no name is given during the SAP ASE start-up, the SAP ASE name defaults to the server name given at installation.

  • DSQUERY – defines the SAP ASE name that client programs try to connect to if no SAP ASE is specified with a command line option. If DSQUERY is not set, and you do not supply the SAP ASE name with a command line option, clients attempt to connect to the server name given at installation.

  • SYBASE – defines the path of the SAP ASE installation directory. The installation program sets up SYBASE to point to the release directory specified during installation.

  • SYBASE_ASE – defines the subdirectory of the SAP ASE components.

  • SYBASE_OCS – defines the subdirectory to which Open Client™ is set.

  • SYBASE_SYSAM – points to the license-management software directory.

  • SYBASE_TS_MODE – on Windows, SAP ASE uses SYBASE_TS_MODE to determine if the shared memory should use a Global namespace or a session-specific Local namespace. Sybase recommends that SAP ASE use a Global namespace to which it can attach diagnostic tools for servers you start as a service, or when connecting to the server through terminal services.

    The default mode in versions of SAP ASE earlier than 15.7 was Local, which imposed diagnostic limitations. In SAP ASE 15.7 and later, the default is Global.

    Setting SYBASE_TS_MODE to local starts SAP ASE in pre- 15.7 default mode. There is no advantage in using a Local namespace and Sybase recommends that you do not do so, because it restricts shared memory access for diagnostic tools.

  • PATH – specifies which directory paths to search for executables and dynamic link libraries (DLLs). The Sybase executables are in the %SYBASE%|product_name\bin directory. The installation program appends these paths to the current PATH environment variable.

  • TEMP – defines the location used by the installation program to write files temporarily during the installation process. The installation process frees the disk space after installation is completed.

  • INCLUDE – specifies which directory to set to or append for Open Client.

  • LIB – is appended with lib directory for Open Client.

Related concepts
Start and Stop Servers