Hi,

I’m asking for opinions and preferences.

There is no right or wrong.

Scenario:

I have a tool (server component, api only, no gui) that has a config file and no per-user adjustable things. The admin can change things, of course.

Now the tool gets plugins, where to configure them?

  1. All in one config file with plugins having a section for their things,
  2. plugins get their own config file.
  3. the main config points to a storage (database) with config options for everything, a kind of variant of 1.
  4. something else/better

Hoping for a civil discussion ;)

Cheers

Grumpy

  • @LodraEnglish
    3•1 month ago

    A complicated plugin ecosystem (e.g. Jenkins) makes for a terrible use experience. It’s annoying to configure a bunch of config files. Managing dependencies can be a complete nightmare. these problems also complicate your ci/cd.

    So I’ll offer a slightly different answer. I prefer a single file instead of splitting up the config. And I’ll use OpenTelemetry as an excellent example of why. the plugins are compiled right into the app binary. This offers a ton of advantages, including a great reason to merge all of your app configs in a single file.

    This really only works well if you have a good app though.