Settings Refinement (#66)

[Iain-Crowe]

Pull Request: Refactor Settings Management (#66)

Description

This pull request introduces significant refactoring to the settings management system. The key changes are as follows:

1. Code Refactoring:

• Merged redundant imports
• Moved hardcoded paths to use os.path.join for better portability
• Introduced global SETTINGS dictionary to hold settings in memory.
• Added type hints for readability.
• Encapsulated private methods and constants for better code organization.

2. Error Handling:

• Created SettingsNotFoundError to handle cases where settings are not initialized properly.
• Improved error handling during file operations, including JSON-specific errors.

3. Functionality Enhancements:

• Added init_settings() method to initialize settings from JSON file.
• Added _dump_settings() method to save the current state of SETTINGS to the JSON file.
• Modified/renamed update_setting() and read_setting() methods to interact with global SETTINGS dictionary.
• NOTE: init_settings() should only be called once, please ask for details on best usage, if unsure.

4. Licensing and Documentation:

• Added the GPL license to top of file.
• Included docstrings for all methods to explain purpose and usage.
• Added a note about how we should handle settings within the project.

Issues Addressed

• Resolves issue Settings Refinement #66: Settings Refinement

How to Test:

1. Run the script to ensure the settings are being properly loaded and saved.
2. Modify a setting and verify the changes are being reflected in the JSON file.
3. Ensure appropriate error messages are displayed when the settings file is missing or corrupted.

Code Sample

if __name__ == "__main__":
    init_settings()
    
    print(read_settings("showtc")
    update_setting("showtc", False)
    print(read_settings("showtc")

Additional Notes

Future improvements could include moving the custom class into a dedicated exceptions file and integrating a logging library for better error tracking (noted in comments).

• Fixed requirements.txt, should be able to simply run pip install -r requirements.txt
• Updated settings usage in other files front.py and orca.py
• Renamed setings to settings

[BlazarKnight]

thanks so much i am so sorry for the delay in review.