Welcome to localconfig’s documentation!

localconfig

A simplified interface to ConfigParser using dot notion with data type / comment support.

Feature Summary

  • Simple access to config using dot notion and iterators
  • Full compatibility with ConfigParser ini formats (as that is used as the backend)
  • Data type support by intelligently guessing the data types based on value on read.
  • Multiple config source input (read from string, file pointer, file, or list of them)
  • Full comment support / retention on save
  • Lazy reading of config sources for performance (only read when a config value is accessed)

Quick Start Tutorial

To install:

pip install localconfig

Let’s say we have a script named ‘program’ with the following config in ~/.config/program:

[Web Server]
# Server host
host = 0.0.0.0

# Server port
port = 8080

# Debug logging
debug = off

To read the config, simply do:

from localconfig import config

start_server(config.web_server.host, config.web_server.port, config.web_server.debug)

# Or use get method:
# start_server(config.get('Web Server', 'host'),
#              config.get('Web Server', 'port'),
#              config.get('web_server', 'debug'))  # Yes, 'web_server' also works here!
#
# Or if the config is in docstring, read from it:
# config.read(__doc__)
#
# Or if the config file is elsewhere:
# config.read('/etc/path/to/config.ini')  # Non-existing file is ignored
#
# Or read from a list of sources
# config.read(['string config', file_path, file_pointer, io.StringIO('config')])
#
# Or create another instance for another config:
# from localconfig import LocalConfig
# config2 = LocalConfig('/etc/path/to/another/config.ini')

Now, let’s do some inspection:

# Iterate over sections and their keys/values
for section in config:
  print section                    # Web Server

  for key, value in config.items(section):
    print key, value, type(value)  # host 0.0.0.0 <type 'str'>
                                   # port 8080 <type 'int'>
                                   # debug False <type 'bool'>

sections = list(config)            # ['Web Server']

# Iterate over keys/values
for key, value in config.web_server:
  print key, value, type(value)    # Same output as above config.items()

items = list(config.web_server)    # [('host', '0.0.0.0'), ('port', 8080), ('debug', False)]
items = dict(config.web_server)    # {'host': '0.0.0.0', 'port': 8080, 'debug': False}

# Check if a section or key is set - any non-existing section or key defaults to None.
if config.web_server or config.no_such_section:
  pass

if config.web_server and (config.web_server.port or config.web_server.no_such_key):
  pass

To add a section and set a value:

config.add_section('App Server', comment='Settings for application server')
config.app_server.host = 'localhost'

# Use `set` if you want to set a comment
config.set('App Server', 'port', 9090, comment='App server port')

# Set value for the DEFAULT section (default value for all other sections)
config.env = 'prod'

To write the config:

config.save()

# Or simply get the config as a string:
# config_str = str(config)
#
# Or save to a different location:
# config.save('/path/to/save/to.ini')

If we open ~/.config/program now, we would see:

Supported Data Types

Data type is guessed based on the value and converted on read.

The following types are supported:

Type Example Value
int 1
float 2.0
bool true false yes no on off (case insensitive)
None none (case insensitive)
str Any other value not matched by above

API Documentation

LocalConfig

Utils

Change Log

Version 1.1.2

  • Allow user to specify custom interpolation instance

Version 1.1.1

  • Remove test concurrency and change default env to cover,style

Version 1.1.0

  • Add support for DEFAULT section
  • Fix style issues
  • Fix tox.ini
  • Switch to 4 space indents

Version 1.0.2

  • Switch to use configparser.read_file
  • Update tox.ini

Version 1.0.1

  • Migrate to Python 3.x

Version 0.4.2

  • Return None instead of raising NoSectionError/NoOptionError
  • Add long description / url
  • Update tox.ini

Version 0.4.1

  • Update tox.ini
  • Update tox.ini to run test by default
  • Ensure last source isn’t set to empty string by checking sys.arg[0] And skip reading last source when it isn’t set.
  • Remove ln whitelist from tox
  • Remove activate symlink
  • Update doc

Version 0.4.0

  • Lazy read configs on access and support list of sources
  • Rename DotNotationConfig to LocalConfig

Version 0.3.6

  • Fix bug in read for non-existing file

Version 0.3.5

  • Only read config file if exists

Version 0.3.4

  • Remove __new__ use as it does not work as expected and move SectionAccessor back into DotNotationConfig as private class
  • Update changelog
  • Add changelog to index

Version 0.3.3

  • Add changelog

Version 0.3.2

  • Add PyPi package link

Indices and tables