cfgio

cfgio is a python library for reading and writing configuration file formats found on a *nix system. The core goal is to provide an r/w API to files in different formats and still maintaining the overall layout (comments, structure) of the files.

Why?

Because i often need to read and write configuration files on systems. Typically i open the file, read it and use a mix of string functions and regular expression to extract the values i need. When it comes to writing configuration files things get nasty. Have you ever tried to diff a config which has been re-written by a program?

Examples

Reading entries from /etc/fstab

from cfgio import fstab
fstab = fstab.FstabConfig('/etc/fstab')
print(fstab.get('/dev/sda2'))

/dev/sda2 on /boot (ext4), opts: noatime,discard (1/2)

** Reading Xen domU configurations **

from cfgio.specialized import xen
cfg = xen.XenConfig('/etc/xen/test.cfg')
print(cfg.get('memory').value)
>> 1024
print(cfg.get('vif').value)
>> [<cfgio.specialized.xen.XenDomUVifConfigValue object at 0x25e6210>]

Attention: work in progress

cfgio is far away from being a full-featured library. Some important features are still missing:

• no multiline support. cfgio will skip subsequent lines and mark them as garbage
• cfgio does not uncomment variables. Instead it will add a new line to the file
• Reading bash "configs" using a KeyValueConfig may lead into suprising result. cfgio does not handle this very well, e.g. splitting up variable assignments into multiple lines.
• ...