-bash: ping: command not found

Sounds like you need to adjust your PATH.

See what it currently looks like:

Command:

echo $PATH

Set your path (can look something like this)

Command:

export PATH=/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin

Or

Edit - nano ~/.bash_profile

If you use something like homebrew, or zsh or others you actually can have a different source profile.

Command:

echo $0

That will tell you what shell you are using.

All you needed to do was export PATH=$PATH, because all of the explicit paths that you set above are already in the default $PATH reference. Make certain that the export command is contained in a .bash_profile within your home directory so that it gets set each time you start the Terminal, and the default Bash shell is run.

Hello banana40,

You will have to correct your path variable.

Hello again banana40,

This is a Terminal configuration issue. On the command-line, everyone's configuration is different. Any instructions I might provide would have to be tailored to your specific configuration. /sbin is already in the default path setting, so if you are lacking that, then you or some 3rd party software has removed it. I can't tell you how to correct that error because I don't how how it was broken.

I suggest creating a new user account in System Preferences > Users & Groups and exploring the default Terminal configuration and environment in that new account. Does ping work there? Compare the settings to your broken account try to find out what went wrong.

My suspicion is that you may have entered some command-line instructions you found on the internet but didn't understand. Therefore I am reluctant to give you any additional instructions that could only cause more damage. You may have also tried to install some ports package like homebrew, Fink, or MacPorts. Those packages make it quick and easy to install software when you don't understand what you are doing. While I don't actively troll against those programs anymore, my low opinion of them has not changed.

Yes. You can create a new account and copy the appropriate shell configuration files from the new account to the original account. You have to make sure to copy while logged into the new account to have the correct permissions. Also make sure to have several Terminal windows open. It is common when attempting repairs like this to scramble your login settings. If you try to create a new Terminal window and you don't get a prompt, you will have to use one of your existing, already open Terminal windows to correct it.

Again, I can't tell you exactly what shell configuration files you need to copy. There are defaults, but you are already not using those, so everything is just a guess. You can try the following files:

.profile

.zshrc

.bashrc

.bash_profile

Maybe one of those will do the trick.