Import and Export config settings

[arjunumenon]

I was setting up CLI in a fresh box where I would be executing commands. Over there, I would love to have all the cli config settings which I have it in current machine in place. In this case, If I want to replicate the same in the new box,

• I may have to know what all settings I had set up in my current machine.
• Get all those settings and its values
• The set each of those settings manually one by one in the new machine.

With this there are chances that I might miss some of my most loved settings.

So for tackling this, I was wondering to have an import and export functionality for my CLI Config Settings.

Export Settings

My idea is to have something like m365 cli config export. This would take my current settings file and will add in my OneDrive.

Import Settings

Once we execute something like m365 cli config import, this will download the file from OneDrive and will paste in our cli config folder.

One pre-requisite over here is to login to the same tenant when you are importing and exporting.

What do you think about this? Do you think it is worth the effort? Need your opinions and suggestions please.

[martinlingstuyl]

Very nice @arjunumenon, that sounds like something I would use!

Also: @Adam-it started a conversation once about contexts. Would this fit in with that discussion as well?

[martinlingstuyl]

This one:

#2853

[Adam-it]

TBH I am not sure this is the same thing. I think what @arjunumenon described is that only to export CLI config set from one env to another using a file.

My idea (for which I was supposed to create an issue but still didn't find time to do it 😔), which is CLI for M365 context is more and idea to have a 'basket' where user may 'input' any kind of option with predefined values, and then when some command is executed which has an option from the 'basket' then user does not need to define it as it will be 'automagically' taken from the basket with the defined value from it.

@arjunumenon TBH I do not quite feel this idea 🙂. I mean every config set is saved in file cli-m365-config.json at location
Windows: %HOMEPATH%.config\configstore
MacOS: /Users//.config/configstore
so the user may just copy that file from one env to another and that's it 👍. Do we really need a command to support it? maybe guidance would be enough 🤔? But of course, I am opened to code anything which will be helpful and the use case you described is really understandable 👍

[martinlingstuyl]

I mean every config set is saved in file cli-m365-config.json at location
Windows: %HOMEPATH%.config\configstore
MacOS: /Users//.config/configstore
so the user may just copy that file from one env to another and that's it

We may see that as the global config, and allow users to differentiate from that global config in a workspace.

That would Be helpful I think. It could even be committed to git repo's along with peoples script files.

We could introduce a .cli/ folder for workspace based settings like this. Or just use the root m365rc.json file that's also used with Aad app save.

Just thinking out loud here. It's slightly different from what @arjunumenon is proposing.

[arjunumenon]

TBH I am not sure this is the same thing. I think what @arjunumenon described is that only to export CLI config set from one env to another using a file.

That is a correct assumption @Adam-it and it is not exactly same @martinlingstuyl . Like Adam mentioned, his use case is to have a bucket (Using Adam's language 😎) in the same environment (Where we are running CLI) with a configuration setup for the sites / tenant which the user frequently uses. With that user may not need to re-enter the option values each and every time. You can correct me Adam If I have understood it incorrectly.
In use case which I was talking about, I have to run CLI in totally different environment (Different machines, Docker Containers, Azure shell etc.)

@arjunumenon TBH I do not quite feel this idea 🙂. I mean every config set is saved in file cli-m365-config.json at location
Windows: %HOMEPATH%.config\configstore
MacOS: /Users//.config/configstore
so the user may just copy that file from one env to another and that's it 👍. Do we really need a command to support it? maybe guidance would be enough 🤔? But of course, I am opened to code anything which will be helpful and the use case you described is really understandable 👍

I may have to gently disagree here with you totally based on my usage approach. Imagine a situation were you are an IT Pro who is developing script for a different client / customer and you would have dedicated machine for you which is meant to run the scripts against the client tenant. Though it is a different tenant, IT Pro would love to have his personalized config settings in that running environment as well (though he may be running against a different tenant, his personal settings would be same). Again that is the way which foresee this use case. So I feel, since we already give a personalized config settings, IT Pro would love to have that moved to a different setup as well.

so the user may just copy that file from one env to another and that's it 👍. Do we really need a command to support it? maybe guidance would be enough 🤔?

For people who uses CLI and knows the running of the same, it may be easy to reconfigure it in a different environment. But for end users, I have feeling it might be a bit overwhelming to find the folder and copy and paste the cli-m365-config.json to that location.
Even if we give that in the guidance docs, there will have to multiple cases like.

• Windows machine.
• 1 for Macos,
• 1 for Docker Containers,
• 1 for Azure Shell.

So in my opinion, if we give it in guidance, it will be super complicated. And especially for copying the cli-m365-config.json to Azure shell setup wouldn't be straight forward I suppose

Do we really need a command to support it?

This is something which we can discuss on can take a decision, whether effort to build the command will quantify the usage and outcome. As a person, I would love to. But again collectively if we decide that it is not worth it, I would be totally ok with that too 🙂

[waldekmastykarz]

CLIs settings are already stored in JSON so export sort of equals to settings list which we already have. As everyone has their own ways of doing backup (some folks use GitHub to store a setup script for their machine) I don't think we should dictate a specific export target.

What is interesting is the ability to import settings from a file which is a convenience shortcut to set multiple settings at once.

[arjunumenon]

CLIs settings are already stored in JSON so export sort of equals to settings list which we already have. As everyone has their own ways of doing backup (some folks use GitHub to store a setup script for their machine) I don't think we should dictate a specific export target.

Ok. That make sense for us not to force someone to have their settings in their OneDrive. My thought was to have an easier way without manual intervention to have the settings transported to a different setup.

What is interesting is the ability to import settings from a file which is a convenience shortcut to set multiple settings at once.

What you have in mind is to have an import from a pre-defined CSV or something?
On the same lines, to have it more interactive, giving it as a One-time configuration also could be something which we can think of. Something which Powerlevel ZSH theme is doing for configuration.

But then again, let us start with something simple, like said, a simple import and if we see that lot of people are using CLI Config extensively, we can bring in the self-configuration setup later too.