How to set env with a dot?

I tried doing that with export and set env, but it did not work. how to do it?

for example

~/directory$ export a.home=1
bash: export: `a.home=1': not a valid identifier

2 Answers

Actually a colleague just asked me and I found a work-around - use

env var.with.dots=value command

The dot is not a valid character in a shell identifier.
So the answer is "you cannot do what you ask":

 name A word consisting only of alphanumeric characters and under- scores, and beginning with an alphabetic character or an under- score. Also referred to as an identifier.