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Creating a Custom Settings Provider

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17 Oct 2007CPOL3 min read 249K   10K   79   64
Demonstration of how to write custom settings providers.

Introduction

This article demonstrates how to write a custom Settings Provider to allow you to persist your My.Settings to your own storage system. The example given creates an XML file in the application folder which is ideal for portable applications. It also includes brief details of how to implement storage onto a U3 compliant USB device.

Background

The My.Settings functionality introduced with .NET 2.0 saves a lot of time and repeated effort for developers by providing a common, easy to use, and well thought out method of loading/saving settings. For a standard WinForms application, this works great, separating local and roaming settings automatically and storing them in the Documents and Settings\User\Local Settings\Application Data and Documents and Settings\User\Application Data folder hierarchies, respectively. But, what happens if you haven't got a typical scenario, say you want settings to be stored on a network drive, or you want them to be portable with the application so they can run off a USB device? As with most things in the .NET framework, you can override this default behaviour thankfully. In this case, it's by writing your own Settings Provider. This sounds daunting, but is actually relatively trivial. All you have to do is create a new class that inherits from SettingsProvider and provide the must override ApplicationName property which I just default to the Product Name.

Using the Code

Using a custom settings provider is simple; just include the class within your application, and when viewing the My Project/Settings page, just set the Provider property (defaults to blank) to your provider class name. Note that the Provider property is set for each setting individually; that way, you could keep some items under the default .NET provider model but override a few critical ones to travel with you using this portable provider.

The screenshot below shows exactly where to change this:

Screenshot - CustomSettingsProvider1.jpg

By default, the roaming property is set to false, which for the portable settings provider will mean that the setting is machine specific. For settings like window size/location, this is desired, but for settings you want to be used regardless of machine (in this example, the UserWord), you should set this to true.

Other than that, handle the settings exactly as you would normally do. In the example app, we just get and set them on our Form Load and Closing events.

When you run the application, it tries to load the settings from an XML file named applicationtitle.settings. Since this does not exist to start with, it uses the default values. Upon exiting the application, the settings file is created. If you have a look at it (in the project's bin/debug folder), you'll see it has the following format;

XML
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<Settings>
  <WorkPC>
    <WindowSize>300, 100</WindowSize>
    <WindowLocation>100, 100</WindowLocation>
  </WorkPC>
  <HomePC>
    <WindowSize>300, 200</WindowSize>
    <WindowLocation>300, 300</WindowLocation>
  </HomePC>
  <UserWord>Test</UserWord>
</Settings>

Notice how the settings that have a roaming value of false are enclosed within an element for the current PC name, whilst the roaming setting of UserWord is at the Settings node level, meaning it is used regardless of the PC you are using.

Also included is a U3 specific settings provider. This inherits from PortableSettingsProvider, overriding the GetAppSettingsPath function which, in this case, tries to retrieve a path from an environment variable. If you're happy with the storing of settings within an XML file but just want to change the location (perhaps a common network mapping), then you can use this inheritance technique as well.

Points of Interest

The real guts of the Settings Provider happen in the GetPropertyValues and SetPropertyValues functions. These pass in a collection object of all properties required to be got/set for this provider, which we just iterate round, loading or saving them to our XML document. I have implemented a SettingsXML property which either loads or creates a new XML document with the required root node.

The final point of interest is the IsRoaming function. This looks through the attributes collection of the objects on the property for a type of SettingsManageabilityAttribute. This attribute being present indicates that the IsRoaming property is set to true.

History

  • 18 October 2007 - Initial article.

License

This article, along with any associated source code and files, is licensed under The Code Project Open License (CPOL)


Written By
Web Developer
United Kingdom United Kingdom
A general purpose analyst programmer working in a small development team for a company in the city.

VB has always been my passion and I code both Win forms and web based systems for both work and fun.

Comments and Discussions

 
QuestionHave you seen the DSL Designer for Custom Settings on codeplex? Pin
pibos24-Oct-08 5:16
pibos24-Oct-08 5:16 
AnswerRe: Have you seen the DSL Designer for Custom Settings on codeplex? Pin
BruceL25-Oct-11 9:29
BruceL25-Oct-11 9:29 
GeneralWriting Settings file to a different location Pin
rctaubert16-Jul-08 13:23
rctaubert16-Jul-08 13:23 
GeneralRe: Writing Settings file to a different location Pin
vbjay.net1-Apr-10 8:20
vbjay.net1-Apr-10 8:20 
GeneralRe: Writing Settings file to a different location Pin
SSDiver21122-Jul-10 17:32
SSDiver21122-Jul-10 17:32 
GeneralRe: Writing Settings file to a different location Pin
vbjay.net2-Jul-10 22:53
vbjay.net2-Jul-10 22:53 
GeneralRe: Writing Settings file to a different location Pin
SSDiver21123-Jul-10 6:07
SSDiver21123-Jul-10 6:07 
GeneralRe: Writing Settings file to a different location Pin
vbjay.net3-Jul-10 6:31
vbjay.net3-Jul-10 6:31 
No. Use 2008 or 2010 with a project that uses framework 3.5 sp1 or 4. That uses LINQ. 2005 does not support later frameworks.
GeneralRe: Writing Settings file to a different location Pin
SSDiver21123-Jul-10 8:05
SSDiver21123-Jul-10 8:05 
GeneralRe: Writing Settings file to a different location Pin
SSDiver21126-Jul-10 10:40
SSDiver21126-Jul-10 10:40 
QuestionWin Form Designer breaking with custom SettingsProvider Pin
Tom Faller20-Jun-08 2:48
Tom Faller20-Jun-08 2:48 
AnswerRe: Win Form Designer breaking with custom SettingsProvider [modified] Pin
GeoffHacker20-Jul-08 15:16
GeoffHacker20-Jul-08 15:16 
GeneralRe: Win Form Designer breaking with custom SettingsProvider Pin
Stewart McGuire10-Dec-08 10:22
Stewart McGuire10-Dec-08 10:22 
GeneralRe: Win Form Designer breaking with custom SettingsProvider Pin
djdombrowski5-May-09 3:03
djdombrowski5-May-09 3:03 
GeneralRe: Win Form Designer breaking with custom SettingsProvider Pin
Matteo Rossi4-Jun-09 5:17
Matteo Rossi4-Jun-09 5:17 
GeneralRe: Win Form Designer breaking with custom SettingsProvider Pin
juan321119-Oct-09 9:05
juan321119-Oct-09 9:05 
GeneralRe: Win Form Designer breaking with custom SettingsProvider Pin
simonlynen26-Nov-09 3:56
simonlynen26-Nov-09 3:56 
GeneralRe: Win Form Designer breaking with custom SettingsProvider Pin
MLLong1-Feb-10 6:38
MLLong1-Feb-10 6:38 
GeneralRe: Win Form Designer breaking with custom SettingsProvider Pin
sybhs7-Jun-15 23:27
sybhs7-Jun-15 23:27 
AnswerRe: Win Form Designer breaking with custom SettingsProvider Pin
Spock11-Aug-10 11:21
Spock11-Aug-10 11:21 
AnswerRe: Win Form Designer breaking with custom SettingsProvider Pin
bwknight8777-Oct-11 6:32
bwknight8777-Oct-11 6:32 
AnswerRe: Win Form Designer breaking with custom SettingsProvider Pin
Member 904782530-May-12 14:55
Member 904782530-May-12 14:55 
AnswerRe: Win Form Designer breaking with custom SettingsProvider Pin
Anthony Tsaukpaetra22-Oct-16 8:34
Anthony Tsaukpaetra22-Oct-16 8:34 
QuestionDoes it support .net 3.5 Pin
sachintana21-Jan-08 20:35
sachintana21-Jan-08 20:35 
GeneralError using the project resources Pin
Snakeskinner6-Nov-07 2:58
Snakeskinner6-Nov-07 2:58 

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