Dotenv-buffer is completely based upon Scott Motte's dotenv.

The following is changed:

• only takes buffer as input
• no cli options
• changed test harnes to tape
• no dependencye on fs, i.e. can be used in React Native

# with npm
npm install dotenv-buffer

# or with Yarn
yarn add dotenv-buffer

As early as possible in your application, require and configure dotenv and pass it a buffer containing a .env file.

const dotenvBuffer = require('dotenv')
const buf = readBufferFromS3orOtherPlace()
dotenvBuffer.config(buf)

The buffer should contain a .env file which you store in a secure place, for example an encrypted S3 bucket. Add environment-specific variables on new lines in the form of NAME=VALUE. For example:

DB_HOST=localhost
DB_USER=root
DB_PASS=s1mpl3

That's it.

process.env now has the keys and values you defined in your .env file.

const db = require('db')
db.connect({
  host: process.env.DB_HOST,
  username: process.env.DB_USER,
  password: process.env.DB_PASS
})

The parsing engine currently supports the following rules:

• BASIC=basic becomes {BASIC: 'basic'}
• empty lines are skipped
• lines beginning with # are treated as comments
• empty values become empty strings (EMPTY= becomes {EMPTY: ''})
• single and double quoted values are escaped (SINGLE_QUOTE='quoted' becomes {SINGLE_QUOTE: "quoted"})
• new lines are expanded if in double quotes (MULTILINE="new\nline" becomes

{MULTILINE: 'new
line'}

• inner quotes are maintained (think JSON) (JSON={"foo": "bar"} becomes {JSON:"{\"foo\": \"bar\"}")
• whitespace is removed from both ends of the value (see more on trim) (FOO=" some value " becomes {FOO: 'some value'})

We will never modify any environment variables that have already been set. In particular, if there is a variable in your .env file which collides with one that already exists in your environment, then that variable will be skipped. This behavior allows you to override all .env configurations with a machine-specific environment, although it is not recommended.

If you want to override process.env you can do something like this:

const fs = require('fs')
const dotenv = require('dotenv')
const envConfig = dotenv.parse(fs.readFileSync('.env.override'))
for (var k in envConfig) {
  process.env[k] = envConfig[k]
}

See LICENSE