Question: I see we can load properties from files ...

# koin-contributors

[Marcello Galhardo]

Question: I see we can load properties from files or by manually adding it to Koin by using the DSL. However, from the DSL we can use the type system (it has a generic parameter) but from the file system it is always considered a String. However, when you load the properties you may run into runtime exceptions if you request a type from the file system property. (Please, see the print screen for the comparison). Is there a reason for this design? It feels really misleading and can cause runtime exceptions if you call the wrong combination. In my humble opinion, we should have 3 possible designs here:

1. All are properties typed (primitives).
2. All are untyped (Strings).
3. We separate the concepts of file system properties and normal properties - and each one of these have a different API (one typed and one untyped).
What are your opinions?

[arnaud.giuliani]

it’s a real topic 🙂 Something around since the first versions. Properties should be anything your want to share across as config constants

[arnaud.giuliani]

loading property file would load it from external file

[Marcello Galhardo]

Yeah, my main problem is that there’s two versions of getProperty and if you call the wrong one you get an exception. For example, two examples will cause a runtime exception:

First example:
1. You load a string from file. ie, timeout=10
2. You read it with getProperty<Int>("timeout").
Second example:
1. You set a string using `setProperty<Int>(“timeout”, 10)
2. You read it with getProperty("timeout").

That happened few times in the codebase I’m working as they have a lot of properties (from file and defined in code). 😞

[Marcello Galhardo]

I will open a issue next days, so we can try to figure out how to fix it.

[arnaud.giuliani]

Yeah, good catch. Need an update on that 👍

[arnaud.giuliani]

thanks for reporting an issue