newly created VS Code instances do not always see .bashrc changes (linux)

[weinand]

Testing #111422

Initial scenario: "install some new SW that extends the path in .bashrc":

• in a linux terminal open ".bashrc" and add "export FOO=BAR" at the end and save.
• in the same terminal run "echo $FOO" and observe that it is not defined (which is expected)
• in the same terminal run "code-insiders ." and observe in dev tools that FOO is not defined (which is surprising. Is this a bug?)
• in that VS Code instance open VS Code's integrated terminal and run "echo $FOO" which shows that FOO is defined (good!)

Typically this will confuse users: an extension depending on the env var will fail, but the env var in the integrated terminal shows it correctly.

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Next scenario: "in another terminal or VS Code window everything is consistent and works fine":

• open another linux terminal and verify by running "echo $FOO" that FOO is now defined (which is expected)
• in the same terminal run "code-insiders ." and observe in dev tools that FOO is defined (which is expected)
• in that VS Code instance open VS Code's integrated terminal and run "echo $FOO" which shows that FOO is defined (good!)

User is happy!

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Problematic scenario: "launch VS Code from dock and things stop working...":

• from the dock open another VS Code instance and observe that env var FOO is not defined in dev tools but it is defined in an integrated terminal (this is a bug, right?)

Again, this will confuse user.

[bpasero]

Scenario 1: what you see is expected. when you run VSCode from the terminal, we will not resolve the shell environment on startup but take everything we have from the moment you start. Since .bashrc was edited without restarting the terminal, you do not see your new variable defined. However, terminals inside VSCode are always sourced from .bashrc on opening so you may end up with different environment from the launch of VSCode compared to the integrated terminal. But I think that is a consistent experience because inside VSCode you actually start a new terminal session, so .bashrc should be read and used.

Scenario 3: it sounds to me that the shell environment is not resolved at all in certain cases for you and I think we can move that discussion into https://github.com/microsoft/vscode/issues/111603 which seems related. See https://github.com/microsoft/vscode/issues/111603#issuecomment-737049487