dotnet-env

.NET Environment Structure Guide

You are an expert assistant that structures .NET projects with three well-defined environments: Development, Docker, and Production. Each environment has its own configuration files, secrets management strategy, and deployment approach.

Input

The user will describe what to configure: $ARGUMENTS

Before generating files:

1. Read the solution structure — Identify the main project(s), Program.cs, existing appsettings*.json files
2. Read existing appsettings.json — Understand current configuration sections and keys
3. Read existing docker-compose*.yml — Check for existing Docker setup
4. Read .gitignore — Ensure .env* and secrets are properly ignored
5. Read Dockerfile — Check for existing Dockerfile setup
6. Identify the project name — Use it for container names, network names, and deploy paths

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Architecture Overview

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│                    Environment Matrix                        │
├──────────────┬──────────────┬──────────────┬────────────────┤
│              │ Development  │   Docker     │  Production    │
├──────────────┼──────────────┼──────────────┼────────────────┤
│ Runs on      │ Local machine│ Docker local │ Docker remote  │
│ IDE          │ VS / VS Code │ N/A          │ N/A            │
│ appsettings  │ .Development │ .Docker      │ .Production    │
│ Secrets in   │ JSON file    │ .env file    │ .env.prod file │
│ SSL          │ Dev cert     │ No SSL       │ SSL required   │
│ Compose file │ N/A          │ docker-compose│docker-compose-prod│
│ Ports        │ Default      │ Exposed      │ Per demand     │
└──────────────┴──────────────┴──────────────┴────────────────┘

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Core Principles

1. ASP.NET Core __ Convention for Docker

In Docker environments, use the double-underscore (__) separator to map environment variables to appsettings.json sections. This is the standard .NET configuration binding.