I'd like to transform the appsettings section of my local web.config file from a bunch of individual settings for my local dev work, to a configSource file path attribute for publishing to client servers.
Basically from this:
<appSettings>
<add key="setting1" value="devVal1"></add>
<add key="setting2" value="devVal2"></add>
<add key="setting3" value="devVal3"></add>
</appSettings>
to this:
<appSettings configSource="clientSettings.config" />
This partial solution adds the configSource attribute.
<appSettings xdt:Transform="SetAttributes(configSource)" configSource="clientSettings.config"/>
But I'm not sure how to remove all the individual settings as well (I think the configSource will override them anyway, but I'd prefer to not have them there at all, to avoid having irrelevant dev settings in each of my client's web.config files)
A bit more perseverance lead me to the answer. Apply the "RemoveAll" transform to an add element within the appSetting.
<appSettings xdt:Transform="SetAttributes(configSource)" configSource="clientSettings.config">
<add xdt:Transform="RemoveAll"/>
</appSetting>
Hope this is of use to someone in the future (if only as an example of why you should do 30 minutes of extra work before reaching for the 'Ask Question' button)...
Related
This answer to another question states:
Do not forget to clear the connectionStrings first:
<connectionStrings>
<clear />
<add name="LocalSqlServer" connectionString="Data Source=(local);Initial Catalog=aspnetdb;Integrated Security=True" providerName="System.Data.SqlClient"/>
</connectionStrings>
... interesting. What does that do?
In .Net config files are inherited, so your applications config will inherit settings from your machines config.
The <clear/> tag will remove any inherited connection strings and thereby avoids confusion and potential problems.
In ASP.Net you may have several inherited connection strings, so this is very common there.
The element removes all sections and section groups from your application that were defined earlier in the current configuration file or at a higher level in the configuration file hierarchy.
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa903345(v=vs.71).aspx
so for example, if this was a child config file and the parent config file had some settings... you may not want them being inherited so you specify the clear flag to clear it and then use your settings.
I have some important settings in the machine.config file and I need to prevent that websites can modify them in thier web.config files. In other words, I need those setting in the web.config files to be ignored.
I know I can lock elements but I don't want to have an exception, I just want to be ignored.
Example:
In machine.config
<appSettings>
<add key="a" value="AAAA"/>
</appSettings>
In web.config
<appSettings>
<add key="a" value="BBBB"/>
</appSettings>
In a website or webapplication
ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["a"] // returns "AAAA" from machine.config
Is it possible to do this?
Clarification:
These settings that I need to protect are the wcf serviceModel client elements and not appSettings as my example.
I currently have 2 x ASP.NET 3.5 web applications in IIS7 (lets call them WebParent and WebChild).
WebChild is nested within the WebParent listing in IIS7 and is set up as an application (rather than just a virtual directory within WebParent). Both currently use their own (Classic) application pool.
Both WebParent and WebChild have their own fully defined web.config files in their own root directories.
I had assumed that seeing as WebChild is defined as an 'Application' within IIS, that it would not inherit anything from the WebParent configuration file. However, despite this configuration, I am seeing errors related to various elements within the web.config already being defined (which is correct, there are a couple items that are in both config files, but I thought they should be treated completely independently from one another)?
Can anyone please clarify why this might be occurring?
The exact solution to your problem will depend on what configuration exception message you are seeing. However, this is a typical problem that can often be solved through use of the inheritInChildApplications attribute on the location element in the web.config for "WebParent". By wrapping the entire system.web section in a location element as follows, you should be able to eliminate the problem you described:
<location path="." inheritInChildApplications="false">
<system.web>
<!-- ... -->
</system.web>
</location>
With IIS 7, you will also want to wrap the system.WebServer section the same way:
<location path="." inheritInChildApplications="false">
<system.webServer>
<!-- ... -->
</system.webServer>
</location>
This solution is based on an excellent blog article that I found here.
If they are repeated, you'll have to <remove/> then in the child application web.config first, then add back the element you'd like it it's place. This is assuming that you'd like to have a different value. If you don't, then just omit the element. A connection string would be a good example of something that is likely common for all applications - so you only need to specify it in the root.
Example:
<siteMap defaultProvider="AdminSiteMapProvider" enabled="true">
<providers>
<remove name="AdminSiteMapProvider"/>
<add name="AdminSiteMapProvider" description="Admin SiteMap provider" type="System.Web.XmlSiteMapProvider" siteMapFile="~/App_Data/admin.sitemap" securityTrimmingEnabled="true" />
</providers>
</siteMap>
I think the inheritInChildApplications="false" is good for cases where you still want to inherit some part of the configuration from the parent.
In cases where you want to completely stop inheritance (as in this case if I'm correct), I'd suggest to use 2 separate application pools for the 2 apps and then apply a not very well documented setting in the applicationHost.config file as I explained in this question “Entry has already been added” - Two Separate App Pools
<add name="MyAppPool" autoStart="true" managedRuntimeVersion="v4.0" managedPipelineMode="Integrated" enableConfigurationOverride="false">
<processModel identityType="NetworkService" />
</add>
Follow Scott's advise and also ensure that you have right clicked WebChild in IIS and selected Convert to Application.
We are working on a web application that creates more web applications.
Each web application will have to get a Url Rewrite rule (URL REWRITE MODULE 2.0).
As far as I know, there's no way to add such rules without modifying the web.config file (am I right??).
So my plan was to work with multiple web.config partial files. One main .config file, and lots of .config files per application (every file will contain it's web application url rewrite rules).
This way sounds a little bit messy, but I can't think of anything else, and suggestions will be welcomed.
So is it possible to use very-multiple web.config files for the root application?
Thanks in advance, Gal.
This following Tag will do the trick.
The absence of this tag was the main reason for my problem when i using with two web.config files for my two different application running in my website.
**<location path="." inheritInChildApplications="false">**
<system.web>
<!-- ... -->
</system.web>
**</location>**
Every application must have a full web.config and not partial, exept if you go with net 4
The trick is to use a lot the remove command on the other inside web.config and remove the parents setting that must not used on this.
For example if on the main root you have the a module that you do not won to use it on the other trees, you use the remove command on all other web.config to remove it. Especial the modules that are on one Bin and not on an other directory bin.
<httpModules>
<remove name="TheHttoModuleNotNeedHere" />
<remove name="AnonymousIdentification" />
... add here your other modules for that directory...
</httpModules>
The remove command is working for almost all sessions on config.
You can do make it work, I have done it, but its a lot of work to find all the conflicts/unnecessary configs and remove it.
For some other session there also the clear command. For example on role Manager you can clear all and add new.
<roleManager enabled="true" ...>
<providers>
<clear />
<add name="MyName" ... type="System.Web.Security.SqlRoleProvider" />
</providers>
Hope this help as tips to make it work.
I want to know what best practice is for accessing settings
in config file when you have dev/test/production types.
If you have different config for each type when you
publish a ASP.NET website doesn't the config get copied as well??
Malcolm
We usually manually inject the settings file on each site. I think that it's uncommon, though not unheard of, to actually rely on VS to publish to your production site. Source control has dev/test/prod/ etc. web.config files.
ConfigurationManager.AppSettings ?
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.configuration.configurationmanager.appsettings.aspx
In Visual Studio 2010 you can maintain Multiple Web.Config and use a transformation to generate the correct Configuration for an environment.
http://blogs.msdn.com/webdevtools/archive/2009/05/04/web-deployment-web-config-transformation.aspx
Basically we can make have one default Web.Config and different Transformation files for each environment e.g.
Web.Debug.Config
Web.Staging.Config
Web.Production.Config
The Transformation file can override the value of a particular config item for the environment e.g.
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<configuration xmlns:xdt="http://schemas.microsoft.com/XML-Document-Transform">
<connectionStrings>
<add name="personalDB"
connectionString="Server=StagingBox; Database=personal; User Id=admin; password=StagingPersonalPassword"
providerName="System.Data.SqlClient" xdt:Transform="Replace" xdt:Locator="Match(name)" />
<add name="professionalDB"
connectionString="Server=StagingBox; Database=professional; User Id=professional; password=StagingProfessionalPassword"
providerName="System.Data.SqlClient" xdt:Transform="Replace" xdt:Locator="Match(name)"/>
</connectionStrings>
</configuration>
Whenever we target build for that environment the Transformation are applied to the default Web.Config file.