CloudConfigurationManager vs WebConfigurationManager?

Question

In an Azure Websites I was always using the following code to fetch some values from the config's app settings:

string property = WebConfigurationManager.AppSettings["property"];  

Just a couple of days ago I stublemd upon CloudConfigurationManager, and with it I can get the property like so:

string property = CloudConfigurationManager.GetSetting("property"); 

Although CloudConfigurationManager seems like it's better fitted to cloud use, I never had any issues with WebConfigurationManager.

• Should I be using CloudConfigurationManager?
• What are the differences between the two?
• In what cases CloudConfigurationManager will behave diffrent from
  WebConfigurationManager?

Answer 1

CloudConfigurationManager enables us to read configuration file regardless of the environment we are in.

So instead of writing environment specific code statements e.g., for web.config file:

WebConfigurationManager.AppSettings["MySetting"]

For ServiceConfiguration.cscfg file:

RoleEnvironment.GetConfigurationSettingValue("MySetting")

We can write the below statement, which will read values from all the configuration files i.e., app.config, web.config and ServiceConfiguration.cscfg.

CloudConfigurationManager.GetSetting("MySetting")

Answer 2

CloudConfigurationManager requires Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Configuration assembly, part of Azure SDK or separate NuGet.

WebConfigurationManager requires System.Web.Configuration assembly, part of .NET Framework.