Strongly typed AppSettings with defaults

Very often I want configurable options for miscellaneous settings; but I hate to shift my focus from the code I'm working on to add a new AppSetting. Sometimes these settings are essential but more often than they are just options that I may need.

So the solution I like to use is to make default values for such AppSettings. If the service you are writing needs to retry a database or web service call a few times, why not make that option configurable but use a default of 5. The method below will grab an AppSetting & try to convert it. If it fails, it uses the default. Plus the generic T can be a value or reference type.


public static T GetAppSetting<T>(string key, T defaultValue)
{
 if (String.IsNullOrEmpty(ConfigurationManager.AppSettings[key])) return defaultValue;

 try
 { 
  return (T)Convert.ChangeType(ConfigurationManager.AppSettings[key], typeof(T));
 }
 catch
 {

 }

 return defaultValue;
}

// Sample Usage
public void DoSomething()
{
 if(GetAppSetting("ShouldRun", true))
 {
  for(int i = 0; i < GetAppSetting("NumberOfTries", 5); i++)
  {
   if(SomeMethodSucceeds()) break;
  }
 }
}

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