Settings For Individual Programmers In A Config File

I'm wondering if there is a way to create settings in a config file for individual programmers. The situation I'm encountering is that there are some programmers who want settings turned on and several that want them turned off. Our config files are in SVN source control, so using a shared config file means we are always overwriting each others settings. We are doing this for an ASP.NET web application project. My initial thoughts would be to create a config file outside of s开发者_开发知识库ource control, but how do I make it so that each programmer has his own copy?

Here is some further clarification. We have a link in the main web.config file that points to an environment-based file (e.g. file used for dev, staging and live).

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<configuration>
  <appSettings configSource="EnvironmentConfigs\appSettings.config" />
  ...
</configuration>

Inside the appSettings.config file, we have settings for dev, staging and live. What I'd like to do is create another config file called user.config and have the individual programmer settings staored there (not in source control of course). What do I need to do in order to have visual studio read from this new file?

The settings file does not need to be versioned in SVN, or each developer can select their settings file to not be overwritten or committed. See the SVN settings file, it could even be added as a global ignore.

Each developer can set up their own build congifuration in Visual Studio. This build configuration should be linked to a build script, which replaces sections of the Web.Config/App.Config/*.Config files specifically as the developer wants.

This way, when they want to make changes to the config files to suit themselves, they should change the replacements in the build script rather than changing the config file directly.

This article covers some of the points i've mentioned: http://www.diaryofaninja.com/blog/2010/05/09/automated-site-deployments-with-teamcity-deployment-projects-amp-svn

Remove the config file from source control and set the svn:ignore property on it. Then it won't be committed. Then, also create another file, like, Production.web.config, that has the production values in it, so you still keep those around too.

That's what I do!

Don't commit config file changes unless they are new settings that to be sent to everyone.

Otherwise, checkout, edit, and leave it checked out. You'll know if someone else has added/modified the file when you get latest version. At which time you merge your settings with their changes, but leave it checked out on your machine.

We do not store application configuration files in source control. Instead, in source control, we store a configuration file template, usually named something like web.config.template. Each developer has their own 'values' file, usually named web.config.values-bem for instance. Each developer also sets up a post-commit hook which takes the template file, and processes it, replacing 'variables' with their values from the specified values file.

For instance, my config values file has the following definition in it:

DB_SERVER=.\SQLEXPRESS

In the web.config.template file, this exists:

connectionString="server=@DB_SERVER@[DEV1];Persist Security Info=True;Password=@DB_PW@;User ID=@DB_USER@;database=@DB_NAME@;Enlist=false;Max Pool Size=100" />

So when the process runs (a python script), it replaces all instances of @DB_SERVER@ with the setting I have in my values file. The template script allows for default values to be specified right in the template as well, so you can make changes to the template file and not break other developers' environments (usually). (The default values are next to the variable, in square brackets.)

This solution allows each developer to have their own settings, but still have a web.config.template file that's versioned, and each developer avoids 'inflicting' configuration changes on other developers.

This works well for us. If you want to use the same scheme, you can check out the code for it on my github: https://github.com/bmontgomery/FileReplace. I can help you with the hook scripts as well if you're interested in that.