I'd like to propose adding official .env file support to central-backend (master branch, current dev version 0.1.0). Currently, configuration is managed exclusively through node-config JSON files (config/default.json, config/local.json, etc.), which makes it harder for operators to:
- Quickly see what configuration options exist without reading source code
- Use environment variable overrides in containerized/cloud environments
- Separate secrets from config files committed to version control
The implementation is straightforward – about 15 lines loaded early in lib/bin/run-server.js before the config module.
Then either patch config/default.json to use ${ENV_VAR} interpolation (supported by node-config), or introduce a thin wrapper that reads env vars and feeds them into config.util.setModuleDefaults.