About

The source command and the point '.' are similar:

Read and execute commands from filename in the current shell environment and return the exit status of the last command executed from filename.

The return status is the status of the last command exited within the script (0 if no commands are executed), and false if filename is not found or cannot be read.

Syntax

. filename [arguments]
source filename [arguments]

where:

• Bash - (Argument|Positional Parameter). If any arguments are supplied, they become the positional parameters when filename is executed. Otherwise the positional parameters are unchanged.
• filename is the file to execute.
  • PATH environment variable: If filename does not contain a slash, file names in PATH are used to find the directory containing filename. The file searched for in PATH need not be executable.
  • When bash is not in posix mode, the current directory is searched if no file is found in PATH.

Example

source ./.bash_profile

is the same as

. ./.bash_profile