Configuration file vs. environment variables

[chillenzer]

What is the benefit of using environment variables over configuration files? While reading the jupyter notebook section, I was so sure you were building up to "Write your configuration to a file" but then encountered "use environment variables".

I'll give you that configuration files need to be parsed but they are much better reproducible and readable.

[edbennett]

My aim was to find something as similar to passing a command-line argument as possible. Having to go via the filesystem to pass an argument from one command to another seems cumbersome.

There could and arguably should be a section on configuration files, but that should not just be for Jupyter notebooks.