Visual Studio Hacks

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Chapter 6, Speed Hacks

#48 Extend the Application Configuration File

HACK

In this file, I am creating a single element called DatabaseSettings that has

three different attributes; the first two are strings and the last is an integer.

You can also define default values for attributes in the template file. In this

example, suppose that I want to set a default value for the

timeout attribute

parameter. I can do this by simply adding a colon after the type and then

specifying my default value. My template file would now look like this:

<configuration>

<DatabaseSettings server="string"

username="string" timeout="int: 60" />

</configuration>

By declaring a default value, the attribute is no longer required. If the

timeout attribute is omitted in the configuration section for this application

config file, the code will simply assume the value is 60. (When declaring

default values for strings, you must use

[Empty] to signify an empty string.)

You can also specify the number of times a section can appear, create section

groups, and specify comments to be included in the generated code. Explana-

tions of these features can all be found in ConfigBuilder’s documentation.

Running the ConfigBuilder

To execute the template file and generate the code, you need to specify Con-

figBuilder as the custom tool for this file. This is done by simply entering

ConfigBuilder into the Custom Tool field in the .XML file’s