envloader

A minimal, standalone .env and .envrc loader with no dependencies.

Why use this instead of direnv?

Well, I'll be honest - use direnv if you can. It's a great tool and I use it myself. I built this because I had an absolute headache trying to get direnv working on a windows machine. It was likely a very specific problem due to a locked down machine. (And profile being on onedrive which was set by a group policy). So 🤷 this is what I came up with.

Features

• Zero dependencies
• Cross-platform support (Windows, Linux, macOS)
• Supports both .env and .envrc files
• Simple shell integration

Installation

Using Homebrew

brew tap willwade/envloader https://github.com/willwade/envloader
brew install willwade/envloader/envloader

Using Scoop

scoop bucket add envloader https://github.com/willwade/envloader
scoop install envloader

Usage

Due to how shell environments work, the way you use envloader depends on your shell:

PowerShell

# Either:
Invoke-Expression $(envloader)
# Or:
. envloader

Bash/Zsh

# Either:
eval "$(envloader)"
# Or:
source envloader

This will:

1. Find the nearest .env or .envrc file
2. Load its environment variables into your current shell session
3. Variables will be available to all processes run in that shell session

Advanced options:

# Load from a specific file
envloader -f path/to/.env

# Search up to specific depth for .env files
envloader --depth 3

Shell Integration

For a more convenient experience, you can add a shell function to your profile:

PowerShell

Add to your $PROFILE (eg. notepad $PROFILE):

function envload { 
    # Join multiple lines into a single string and pipe to Invoke-Expression
    envloader | Out-String | Invoke-Expression
}

Bash

Add to your ~/.bashrc:

envload() {
    eval "$(envloader)"
}

Zsh

Add to your ~/.zshrc:

envload() {
    eval "$(envloader)"
}

Fish

Add to your ~/.config/fish/functions/envload.fish:

function envload
    eval (envloader)
end

After adding to your profile and restarting your shell, you can simply use:

envload

This will load environment variables from the nearest .env or .envrc file.

How it works

The envloader binary:

1. Finds and reads .env/.envrc files
2. Outputs shell-appropriate commands for evaluation
3. Variables are set in your shell when commands are evaluated

Building from source

Requires Go 1.x or higher and goreleaser to be installed.

git clone https://github.com/willwade/envloader
cd envloader
goreleaser build --snapshot --skip-publish

License

MIT License

---

Note: To use the GitHub releases, you'll need to set up a GITHUB_TOKEN with appropriate permissions if you're downloading from private repositories.