App.config

The Mobile.BuildTools now includes support for using an app.config. It's important to note that we do not use the System.Configuration.ConfigurationManager, and instead use a lightweight custom implementation that allows you to initialize custom configurations at runtime which may not follow the typical app.config naming or perform transformations at runtime though this is generally not a good practice.

By default Mobile.BuildTools will look for any file in the root of the head project named app.config or app.*.config. All of those files will be bundled automatically into the native app. If your file has an environment config for the build configuration such as app.debug.config this will perform a transform during build on the bundled app.config.

{
  "$schema": "https://mobilebuildtools.com/schemas/v2/buildtools.schema.json",
  "appConfig": {
    "strategy": "TransformOnly"
  }
}

Note

By default the Mobile.BuildTools will only bundle the transformed app.config into your project. You can optionally set the strategy to BundleAll or BundleNonStandard if you require runtime transformations.

App Config Strategy

Strategy	Description
TransformOnly	This the default strategy which will perform the transformation and only bundle a single transformed app.config into your project.
BundleAll	When set as the app config strategy this will bundle any app.config that you may have such as app.debug.config or app.release.config
BundleNonStandard	When set as the app config strategy this will limit bundled app config's to any that are not for standard Xamarin build configurations which include Debug, Release, Store, & AdHoc.

Note

All file names are compared ignoring case.

Supported Platforms

Platform	Supported
NetStandard	Yes
NetCoreApp	3.1
Xamarin.iOS	Yes
MonoAndroid	8.0+
UWP*	16299+
Xamarin.Mac*	Yes
Xamarin.TVOS*	Yes
Tizen*	Yes

Note

Platform's with an asterisk have not been tested explicitly.

F.A.Q.

Q. Can I use the ConfigurationManager without using the Mobile.BuildTools? A. Yes you absolutely can. The AppConfigSample project in the samples folder does exactly that!

Q. How do I use the Environments? A. By default Environments are disabled. This means that we will only copy the transformed app.config into your project and the ConfigurationManager will only read the primary app.config.