While logged in as user lfs, issue the following commands to set up a good work environment: cat > ~/.bash_profile << "EOF" umask 022 LFS=/mnt/lfs LC_ALL=POSIX CC="gcc -s" export LFS LC_ALL CC EOF source ~/.bash_profile This profile sets the umask to 022, so newly created files will and directories will have the correct permissions. To be more specific, only the file owner will have write permission to new files and directories. Other users of the system will be have read permission, and executable permission to directories. It is advisable to keep this setting throughout your LFS installation. The LFS, LC_ALL, and CC environment variables are also set. The LFS variable has been explained in previous chapters. LC_ALL is a variable used for internationalization. The LC_ALL variable controls the localization of certain programs, making their messages follow the conventions of a specified country. If your host system uses a version of glibc older than 2.2.4, having LC_ALL set to something other than "C" or "POSIX" during Chapter 5 may cause trouble if you exit the chroot environment and wish to return later. By setting LC_ALL to "POSIX" ("C" is an alias for "POSIX") we ensure that everything will work as expected in the chroot environment. CC is a variable we set in order to prevent debugging symbols from being compiled into our static packages. By omitting these symbols during the linking stage of compilation, we save hard drive space and decrease our build time. We are now prepared to begin building the temporary tools which will support us in later chapters.