RailsConfig

Summary

RailsConfig helps you easily manage environment specific Rails settings in an easy and usable manner

Features

• simple YAML config files
• config files support ERB
• config files support inheritance
• access config information via convenient object member notation

Compatibility

• Rails 3.0

For older versions of Rails and other Ruby apps, use AppConfig.

Installing on Rails 3

Add this to your Gemfile:

gem "rails_config"

Customizing RailsConfig

You may customize the behavior of RailsConfig by generating an initializer file:

rails g rails_config:install

This will generate config/initializers/rails_config.rb with a set of default settings as well as to generate a set of default settings files:

config/settings.yml
config/settings/development.yml
config/settings/production.yml
config/settings/test.yml

Accessing the Settings object

After installing this plugin, the Settings object will be available globally. Entries are accessed via object member notation:

Settings.my_config_entry

Nested entries are supported:

Settings.my_section.some_entry

If you have set a different constant name for the object in the initializer file, use that instead.

Common config file

Config entries are compiled from:

config/settings.yml
config/settings/#{environment}.yml
config/environments/#{environment}.yml

Settings defined in files that are lower in the list override settings higher.

Reloading settings

You can reload the Settings object at any time by running Settings.reload!.

Reloading settings and config files

You can also reload the Settings object from different config files at runtime.

For example, in your tests if you want to test the production settings, you can:

Rails.env = "production"
Settings.reload_from_files(
  Rails.root.join("config", "settings.yml").to_s,
  Rails.root.join("config", "settings", "#{Rails.env}.yml").to_s,
  Rails.root.join("config", "environments", "#{Rails.env}.yml").to_s
)

Environment specific config files

You can have environment specific config files. Environment specific config entries take precedence over common config entries.

Example development environment config file:

#{Rails.root}/config/environments/development.yml

Example production environment config file:

#{Rails.root}/config/environments/production.yml

Embedded Ruby (ERB)

Embedded Ruby is allowed in the configuration files. See examples below.

Accessing Configuration Settings

Consider the two following config files.

#{Rails.root}/config/settings.yml:

size: 1
server: google.com

#{Rails.root}/config/environments/development.yml:

size: 2
computed: <%= 1 + 2 + 3 %>
section:
  size: 3
  servers: [ {name: yahoo.com}, {name: amazon.com} ]

Notice that the environment specific config entries overwrite the common entries.

Settings.size   # => 2
Settings.server # => google.com

Notice the embedded Ruby.

Settings.computed # => 6

Notice that object member notation is maintained even in nested entries.

Settings.section.size # => 3

Notice array notation and object member notation is maintained.

Settings.section.servers[0].name # => yahoo.com
Settings.section.servers[1].name # => amazon.com

Authors

• Jacques Crocker
• Fred Wu
• Inherited from AppConfig by Christopher J. Bottaro