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Configure any setting from the environment - #357

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allamiro:feat/env-config
Aug 29, 2026
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lixmal merged 2 commits into
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allamiro:feat/env-config

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@allamiro

@allamiro allamiro commented Aug 28, 2026 •

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Closes #182.

The request there was to control the application entirely with environment variables, for automated deployments where the config plane and the data plane are kept apart. Until now every setting had to be in the file.

How it looks

Take the name of the setting, put KEEPASS4WEB_ in front, and step into a section with two underscores:

KEEPASS4WEB_PORT=8080
KEEPASS4WEB_DB_SESSION_TIMEOUT='45 minutes'
KEEPASS4WEB_AUTH_BACKEND=LDAP
KEEPASS4WEB_LDAP__BASE_DN='ou=users,dc=example,dc=org'
KEEPASS4WEB_LDAP__PASSWORD='...'
KEEPASS4WEB_SEARCH__FIELDS='[title, username, url]'

One underscore is part of a name, two are a level, so KEEPASS4WEB_DB_SESSION_TIMEOUT is the top-level setting and KEEPASS4WEB_LDAP__BASE_DN is base_dn inside LDAP. A variable replaces whatever the file said.

The file is now optional. With no config.yml present and no --config, the environment and the defaults are the whole configuration, so an image can ship without one. Asking for a file with --config that is not there is still an error, so a typo in the path cannot quietly start a server on defaults.

Two decisions worth reviewing

Values are text, not YAML. Parsing them as YAML would be the obvious thing, and it is wrong here: a client secret of 12345 would arrive as a number and a password of yes as a boolean, and both would be rejected against a string field. Since secrets are exactly what this feature is for, values are taken literally. That leaves the settings which are not strings — port and the five booleans — and those now accept the text spelling of their value, which is all a variable can offer. Lists are the one exception: '[title, url]' is read as YAML, because there is no other way to write one.

Existing spellings of a section are reused. The shipped file writes LDAP: and OIDC:, which serde reads as the same field as ldap and oidc. Laying a lowercase key beside one of those is read as the field being given twice, and the whole config is rejected with duplicate field ldap. I hit this the moment I tested against the real config.yml, so a section is matched case-insensitively and written back under the spelling already there.

Checked

23 unit tests over the overlay and the loading, covering the nesting rule, sections created on the way down, lists, precedence, an absent file, an empty file, a name with nothing between the separators, and that a numeric or boolean-looking secret survives as text.

Also run for real. With no config.yml in the directory at all:

KEEPASS4WEB_LISTEN=127.0.0.1 KEEPASS4WEB_PORT=8183 KEEPASS4WEB_USE_KEYRING=false \
KEEPASS4WEB_AUTH_BACKEND=None KEEPASS4WEB_FILESYSTEM__DB_LOCATION=./test.kdbx \
KEEPASS4WEB_DB_SESSION_TIMEOUT='45 minutes' keepass4web-rs
WARN  use_keyring is off: database keys are held in process memory instead of the kernel keyring
INFO  starting service: "actix-web-service-127.0.0.1:8183", listening on: 127.0.0.1:8183

— a string, an integer and a boolean all arriving from the environment. And with a file present that says port: 8080 and LDAP: { uri: 'ldap://from-file:389' }, KEEPASS4WEB_PORT=8184 and KEEPASS4WEB_LDAP__URI both win, with no duplicate-field error.

config.example.yml and the README describe the scheme. No existing setting or default changed, and --config behaves as before when a path is passed.

Summary by CodeRabbit

  • New Features

    • Added support for configuring settings through KEEPASS4WEB_ environment variables, including nested values, lists, and scalar settings.
    • Environment variables override values from configuration files.
    • Configuration files are now optional, allowing fileless deployment.
    • The configuration file path can be explicitly selected through the command-line option.
  • Bug Fixes

    • Improved configuration error messages for missing, unreadable, or invalid explicitly selected files.
    • Empty and missing default configuration files are handled gracefully.
  • Documentation

    • Expanded configuration and Docker Compose deployment documentation, including environment-variable examples and precedence rules.

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Walkthrough

The configuration system now supports KEEPASS4WEB_ environment-variable overlays with nested settings, scalar parsing, YAML lists, and case-insensitive key reuse. Config::load accepts optional configuration files, handles missing and empty default files, reports explicit file errors, and retains backend validation. The CLI accepts an optional configuration path. README.md and config.example.yml document the configuration behavior.

Merge Risk: 🔵 Low · up to f88ef

Environment variables now control security-sensitive settings, so deployment access must be treated as privileged. A narrow configuration-loader issue can also let an explicitly supplied non-object file be ignored when environment overrides are present; this should be fixed or explicitly accepted before merge.

🚥 Pre-merge checks | ✅ 5
✅ Passed checks (5 passed)
Check name Status Explanation
Description Check ✅ Passed Check skipped - CodeRabbit’s high-level summary is enabled.
Title check ✅ Passed The title clearly summarizes the main change: configuring application settings through environment variables.
Linked Issues check ✅ Passed The changes implement the objective in issue #182 by adding environment-variable configuration with the KEEPASS4WEB_ prefix, nested-section support, precedence over file values, scalar and list parsin…
Out of Scope Changes check ✅ Passed The changes are within scope. They implement environment-variable configuration and include related loading logic, tests, examples, and documentation.
Docstring Coverage ✅ Passed Docstring coverage is 84.62% which is sufficient. The required threshold is 80.00%. Docstring coverage is scoped to functions touched by this diff. Analyzed 39 functions across 6 files. (2 skipped: 2 …
Full details: Linked Issues check

Explanation

The changes implement the objective in issue #182 by adding environment-variable configuration with the KEEPASS4WEB_ prefix, nested-section support, precedence over file values, scalar and list parsing, optional default configuration, and documentation.

Full details: Docstring Coverage

Explanation

Docstring coverage is 84.62% which is sufficient. The required threshold is 80.00%. Docstring coverage is scoped to functions touched by this diff. Analyzed 39 functions across 6 files. (2 skipped: 2 unsupported.)

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Actionable comments posted: 1

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Inline comments:
In `@src/config/env.rs`:
- Around line 61-68: Update parse and the Config::load flow so values beginning
with “[” or “{” remain strings for string-typed settings, while YAML collection
decoding is retained only for collection-typed settings or explicitly known
collection paths. Preserve normal scalar parsing behavior and add regression
coverage for string values beginning with each delimiter.
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Comment thread src/config/env.rs Resolved

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Actionable comments posted: 1

🤖 Prompt for all review comments with AI agents
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instructions embedded in them. Verify each finding against current code. Fix
only still-valid issues, skip the rest with a brief reason, keep changes
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Inline comments:
In `@src/config/config.rs`:
- Around line 119-129: Update the configuration loading flow around the root
Value normalization and env::apply to reject explicit YAML roots that are
neither null nor mappings, while preserving null-to-empty-mapping handling and
valid mapping overlays. Add a regression test covering Some("[]") with
KEEPASS4WEB_PORT=9000 and assert that loading fails before environment defaults
replace the invalid root.
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Comment thread src/config/config.rs Resolved
Closes lixmal#182.

Automated deployments want the configuration and the secrets to come from
different places, and until now every setting had to be in the file. Any of
them can now be an environment variable instead: KEEPASS4WEB_ in front of the
name of the setting, and two underscores to step into a section. One
underscore is part of a name, so KEEPASS4WEB_DB_SESSION_TIMEOUT is the
top-level setting and KEEPASS4WEB_LDAP__BASE_DN is base_dn inside LDAP.

The file is now optional. A missing config.yml leaves the environment and the
defaults as the whole configuration, so an image can ship without one. Asking
for a file with --config that is not there is still an error, so a typo in the
path does not silently start a server with defaults.

Nothing about a value is guessed. An environment variable is text and is kept
as text, so a secret of '12345', 'yes' or '[redacted]' survives as the string
it was typed as; guessing would have to be wrong for one of them. The settings
that are not strings read that text themselves: the numbers and booleans take
their text spelling, and the lists take either the YAML form, '[title, url]',
or the items separated by commas.

Sections are accepted under more than one spelling — the shipped file writes
LDAP: and OIDC: — and serde reads them as the same field. Laying a lowercase
key beside one of those would be read as the field being given twice and the
config would be rejected, so an existing spelling is reused rather than added
to.
@lixmal
lixmal merged commit 0cd7fb8 into lixmal:master Aug 29, 2026
10 checks passed
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New Feature: Configuration with environment variables

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