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phpconfigurationconfiguration-files

Handling config in large PHP projects?

When making a website, I have always just had a single config.php file with a bunch of constants in it, and I include it at the top of every PHP file:

1. config.php

// config.php

$hostname = get_user();
define("HOME", "/home/$hostname/my/website");

define("DB_USER", 'username');
define("DB_PASS", 'password');

This is easy enough and I've never had a problem with it. But is this the standard way to handle config in a big PHP website?

I thought it might be better to contain all the config in a class, like this:

2. Config class

class Config {

    public $home;

    const DB_USER = 'username';
    const DB_PASS = 'password';

    function __construct() {
        $hostname = get_current_user();
        $this->home = "/home/$hostname/my/website";
    }

}

But this seems to make the config more complex, because:

  1. Instead of just needing to include the file, I now also need to instantiate a Config object first.
  2. I need to use a mix of properties and class constants, because some parts of the config are set dynamically.
  3. The overall code just isn't quite as simple.

Summary.

I realize the class provides namespacing, but is there anything much more beneficial about putting config in to a class like this?

In short, is it still perfectly fine these days to stick to a classic config.php file, or are there reasons why I look toward using a more OOP approach to configuration?

EDIT:

I also found this answer very helpful: https://codereview.stackexchange.com/questions/79528/standard-and-common-config-file-for-core-php-project?newreg=eb97ce022c9f4e8a98a1e2d3547b767a

Solution

  • It's fine to use site wide config files. You would typically use a config class for library-specific configs so that a library only strictly accepts well defined config objects as its dependency instead of arrays. As a bonus, you get the added benefit of type hinting the config parameters.