Configuration Management

So you want to reuse your components or code across more than one site. But that means storing configuration information unique to each site so your code will behave the way it needs to.

In IguanaX, you can use :

Custom fields

Custom Fields are a good method for configuring details which apply to a specific component.

You can create custom fields in the Translator config.json file and include default values that are stored in source control. Custom fields entered in the Component Card are encrypted and stored locally in the working directory Component Configuration Files.

Environmental variables

Environment Variables are good for dealing with properties which need to be defined across the server. They are stored locally in your working directory Environment Variables Configuration File.

Other techniques like having the ability to load configuration files from other components

There is a small library to allow one to load a JSON file from another component when you supply the name of the component and the name of the file.

This might be helpful: CONFIG Library

When using configurations in the Translator, there are two general rules:

1) Avoid harcoding

It is best to avoid hardcoding values! Instead, parameterize any values that can change.

In the Translator, you want to see as little text as possible.

Good values to parameterize are values like URLs, file paths, database names, etc.

2) Centralize your configurations

What you want to avoid is having configurations scattered all over your code - this makes it difficult to support and see what is configurable.

We recommend that you capture your configurations in the main.lua module only, and then pass your configurations to your functions. This has a side effect of making your functions more portable - if you need to call a function anywhere.

For example with configurations stored in custom fields, you can just pass the table of Configs into the function directly.