This question already has answers here:
What is the best way to store user settings for a .NET application?
(8 answers)
How can I save application settings in a Windows Forms application?
(14 answers)
Closed 9 years ago.
The question is quite simple: I have developed a WinForms application using C# .Net 4.0. I want to implement a form where a user can set the settings of the application, like short keys, connection string, server name, financial year etc.
Once user has set all the settings, these settings would be available even after user closes the application and then open it again. Like in many video players, we use hot keys and set keys according to our needs. Every time we run our media player, the settings are preserved, unless we change them again. This is what I want in my application.
Well, one approach hit in my mind. That is to use caching. Actually, I dont want to store this information in my database. It would be an extra overhead. So guys what is the best approach to achieve the criteria I described? If caching, then why? What are the advantages and disadvantages?
Any help is appreciated.
You have many options.
You can use App.Config
You can create a flat text file where all the settings could be
stored. (Use delimiters to separate key and value.)
You can use an XML file to save all the setting.
Most of the program used to store the settings in %AppData% folder.
There is a built in feature for what you are looking to do - the Settings file.
See Using Settings in C# on MSDN:
The .NET Framework 2.0 allows you to create and access values that are persisted between application execution sessions. These values are called settings. Settings can represent user preferences, or valuable information the application needs to use. For example, you might create a series of settings that store user preferences for the color scheme of an application. Or you might store the connection string that specifies a database that your application uses. Settings allow you to both persist information that is critical to the application outside of the code, and to create profiles that store the preferences of individual users.
Though written for .NET 2.0 and Visual Studio 2005, it is still relevant.
Why are a few bits and bytes of settings "overhead"? Also what do you think caching is going to solve? Caching is runtime, so when the user closes the application the settings are lost.
You can store the settings in any way you like. Database, application settings, or roll your own format.
Related
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Preserve data between application executions
(4 answers)
Closed 4 years ago.
I want to use a data saving feature in several of my simple winform apps. Is there a way to simply save a value of variables somewhere (Database, Textfile) and load it after each start of the app?
And what is the simplest way to do so?
There are too many ways to save your data after closing, some of them :
Settings
to add it programmatically, you can do :
System.Configuration.SettingsProperty property = new System.Configuration.SettingsProperty("Sample1");
Properties.Settings.Default["Sample1"] = SomeStringValue;
Properties.Settings.Default.Save();
Database
You can save your data in database tables if they are large
XML File
if you have a medium embedded data the xml file is the way to go.
Finally, its all depends on what data you want to store.
You can use one of the options below
Use the settings that come with visual studio to save your variable and load them back when you start the app the next time.Like below
Go to your project properties and go to settings then add a new settings . You can add as many settings as you want using the settings designer. They can be of different variable types (string, color,into,etc)
To change a setting from code, use
//we created a setting named 'mysetting' of type to string
Properties.Settings.Default.mysetting = "test string";
//Save the setting
Properties.Settings.Default.Save();
//To get the value of a setting, use
string mystr = Properties.Settings. Default.mysetting;
You can simply write the value of the variable to a text file and read it back on startup.
One of the easiest solution for your would be to use the Application Settings which inside Visual Studio, you can easily do much of the work in the design time as well.
Starting with the .NET Framework 2.0, you can create and access values
that are persisted between application execution sessions. These
values are called settings. Settings can represent user preferences,
or valuable information the application needs to use. For example, you
might create a series of settings that store user preferences for the
color scheme of an application. Or you might store the connection
string that specifies a database that your application uses. Settings
allow you to both persist information that is critical to the
application outside the code, and to create profiles that store the
preferences of individual users.
Read the documentation for examples.
You can use System.Configuration.Settings which will save your configs into YourProgram.exe.config in xml format, but YOU WILL NEED TO CALL Save() MANUALLY TO SAVE THE MODIFIED CONFIG. In .Net programming, I consider it very convenient.
You can also define your own config file, a simple approach can be using json.
Another approach is to use a local database like sqlite(recommended) or access(less recommended) an define a table called 'config' to save all your config fields.
The least recommended approach is to save your config into windows registery.WHICH WILL MAKE YOUR USER VERY ANNOYED.
I would like to store some configurable data (hosts, keys etc.) in my universal app. The data would be defined before running the app and never changed at runtime. What is the best way to achieve this? I've come across a similar question, but there must be some built-in mechanism.
Here you will find some info: Store and retrieve settings and other app data
If you want to have a file with settings that are known at compile time you can add a json or xml file in your solution and use it as a config file in code.
Can anyone provide a best-practices example for where to store user preferences for a C# Windows app?
So far I've heard a number of options:
Some people are saying to store it in
SQLite. Is SQLite bundled with .NET
2.0 and immediately available for use to me?
Others have said to use the built-in
Application Settings... but I've
heard that the per-user settings here
disappear if you upgrade the app (an
obvious problem).
I've also considered just storing it
in a .xml file somewhere on disk...
but where it the "correct" place to
store that .xml file for the user?
SQLite is not included with .NET2, but you could ship it with your application
The built-in settings system works fine for simple apps - you do need to add a couple of lines of boilerplate to deal with version changes but it's not complicated.
You could put your xml file here:
Environment.GetFolderPath(
Environment.SpecialFolder.LocalApplicationData)
There is a lot of 'it depends' about your question, as you don't say how much of what types of data you need to store, nor if you have any other reasons to care where it goes.
The per-user settings "disappearing" can be solved thus: .NET ApplicationSettingsBase Should I call Upgrade() every time I load?
Storing user application settings in isolated storage seems to be a best practice.
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.io.isolatedstorage(v=vs.80).aspx
Storing settings as an xml file is perfectly fine.
Why would/should I use a ".settings" file instead of taking the information and storing it in a flat file? How do I access and modify the settings from this window from my application windows. Do I need to create an instance of the file or is it static?
Why would/should I use a ".settings"
file instead of taking the information
and storing it in a flat file?
You can store it in a flat file. But, with C# in VS IDE there is a default support to store and access these settings
From MSDN:
....allows you to create and access values that are persisted between application execution sessions. These values are called settings. Settings can represent user preferences, or valuable information the application needs to use. For example, you might create a series of settings that store user preferences for the color scheme of an application. Or you might store the connection string that specifies a database that your application uses. Settings allow you to both persist information that is critical to the application outside of the code, and to create profiles that store the preferences of individual users.
How do I access and modify the
settings from this window from my
application windows. Do I need to
create an instance of the file or is
it static? How do I access and modify
the settings from this window from my
application windows.
Refer to these links:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa730869%28VS.80%29.aspx
http://www.jeffkwak.com/blog/archive/2008/02/29/winform-settings-with-c.aspx
In addition to PK's excellent answer, the settings are also strongly-typed. When you get/set settings within your code, they are already in the required type, so you don't have to worry about serialization - it's handled for you.
Hey, I want to store application configuration data. Currently, I'm using INIs but they are too old and now I want to try something new. I'm on .NET platform using C#.
What solutions do I have? app.configs?
The scenario here is like that, I want to let other programs read the configuration data.
Yes, the various .config files (app.config, web.config, etc..) have replaced INI and, to a certain extent, the Registry as the preferred means of storing configuration data for your application.
Any program, .Net or otherwise, can read those files. .Net has the ConfigurationManager class and other languages can simply do XML parsing to get the values they need.
The standard approach with .NET is to use app.config files for application settings and user.config files for user specific settings (the location varies between XP and Vista though).
There's nothing to stop other programs reading the configuration data, you just need to have a configuration setting in the second (or third) application that tells it where to look.
The app.config would be the preferred way of doing things in .NET. Should work fine to read from other applications as well, as long as you give them the right path to the file. And it's just an XML file, so you can read it from non .NET apps as well.
If you're using Visual Studio, you can use Application Settings for this purpose. Just open the automatically added Settings.settings or create another one. They will be automatically available in Properties.Settings.Default and are stored as XML. You can also have multiple settings files for different purposes.
This is a Visual Studio concept rather than a .NET concept.
I often use an SQL table to hold my application settings. I create a singleton class, ususally called AppSettings, that I load with data from the table. The AppSettings class is then used to get the config values instead of directly accessing the config files. For ASP.Net apps, I instantiate the AppSettings class in the Application_Start event in Global.asax.cs.
Doing this gives me a way to allow the user to control some of the app settings, e.g. an email address for notifications. It also can simplify things when maintaining prod, QA, and dev versions of the app (assuming you have separate database instances for each)