Creating Configuration Files

System Settings provides an Export option that becomes available once you modify a configuration entry. Exporting is the recommended way to create .config files: you download a .config file containing the entry’s settings in a key=value format. Liferay DXP exports an entry’s total available configuration keys and values, even if only one value was changed. You can export a single configuration entry or the entire set of modified configurations.

To avoid a file name conflict, name configuration files using a unique identifier. For example, the Journal Service entry, which backs Web Content functionality, has this file name:

com.liferay.journal.configuration.JournalServiceConfiguration.config

Figure 1: The Web Content System Settings entry has the back-end ID com.liferay.journal.configuration.JournalServiceConfiguration.

Figure 1: The Web Content System Settings entry has the back-end ID `com.liferay.journal.configuration.JournalServiceConfiguration`.

Key/Value Syntax

The syntax for all keys and values in a .config file is the same:

configurationName="value"

For single value configurations without special characters, that’s all there is to know. Settings with multiple values and certain characters require slight modifications.

Multi-Value Settings

Configuration entries can have properties that accept multiple values. For example, a configuration property for specifying supported file extensions needs more than one value. Here’s how to write a multi-value setting in a .config file:

multiValueSetting=["Value 1","Value 2", ...]

Do not use a space character between values (after the comma). The property won’t be loaded.

Open the Web Content category in System Settings (under the Content section), and select Web Content for the virtual instance scope. You’ll see what looks like multiple single value entries for Characters Blacklist:

Figure 2: The Web Content System Settings entry has many Characters Blacklist fields.

Figure 2: The Web Content System Settings entry has many *Characters Blacklist* fields.

In the configuration file, this is really a single key with an array of comma-separated values:

charactersblacklist=["&","'","@","\\","]","}",":","\=",">","/","<","[","{","%","+","#","`","?","\"",";","*","~"]

Escaping Characters

Double quotes (") and equals signs (=) must be escaped in .config files. Escaping is using another character to denote that a character shouldn’t be used in its normal way. Since double quotes and equals signs are already used in .config files, escaping them tells the framework not to read them the normal way, but to pass them through as part of the value. Use a backslash to escape characters in the .config file:

charactersblacklist=["&","\"","\="]

This setting illustrates a multi-value setting with a regular, unescaped character (&), and two escaped ones (\" and \=).

Along with the mandatory escaping of double quotes and equals characters, it’s beneficial to escape spaces inside values to avoid problems. In this example, a backslash is used before each space character to ensure it’s read and processed properly:

blacklistBundleSymbolicNames=["Liferay\ Marketplace","Liferay\ Sharepoint\ Connector"]

If you don’t escape spaces yourself, the framework adds the backslash for you after deployment.

Typed Values

The .config file format supports specifying the type of a configuration value by inserting a special type marker character. Because Liferay DXP already knows the correct type for each configuration property, the type characters are only useful for informational purposes. For example, a configuration with a boolean type has B just before the value to mark it as a boolean type:

addDefaultStructures=B"true"

If you see type markers in .config files, you can safely ignore them. The example included above functions identically without the type marker:

addDefaultStructures="true"

Deploying a Configuration File

Once you have a configuration file, deploy it. It’s registered and the targeted configuration values are updated automatically.

To deploy the .config file, place it in your Liferay Home’s osgi/configs folder. To change the configuration further, you can edit the .config file directly or use System Settings.

Configuration Files and Clustering

In a clustered environment, each node needs the same configuration values for each entry. For example, all nodes should use the same Blogs configuration settings. To accomplish this, deploy copies of the same .config file to each node’s [Liferay Home]/osgi/configs folder.

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