Why is there a .bash_profile and .bashrc, they seem to do the same thing? [duplicate]

Question

Possible Duplicates:
When does mac/ubuntu use .bash_profile and/or .bashrc?
Difference between .bashrc and .bash_profile

I loaded up ubuntu on a vm on my windows computer, and my .bash_profile doesn't seem to load when I open up a terminal (I have to source .bash_profile to get it to work).

Do some systems load .bashrc by default, while others (like Mac osx) loads .bash_profile?

Answer 1

This answer to an earlier question of yours actually already also answers this: depending on how your bash is invoked, it reads different files. For a detailed guide, see this web page.

The first few comments on this answer might also help you.