Configuration Management & Secrets Basics: Engineering for Vibe Coders

Vibe coding makes it easy to get something working quickly, but it just as easily leads to hard-coded URLs, API keys in source code, and environment variables scattered inconsistently across files. These choices work until the day they don’t.

Configuration management and secrets handling are the foundation for stable, portable, and secure applications. Even simple prototypes benefit from treating configuration and secrets deliberately. The earlier you build these habits, the easier your path becomes as your prototype evolves.

1. What configuration management is and why it matters

Configuration management is the practice of keeping environment-specific values out of your code so your application can run anywhere without modification. This includes things like:

• API base URLs
• Feature flags
• Model provider settings
• Logging levels
• Timeouts, thresholds, and limits
• Integration endpoints

Hard-coding these makes your prototype brittle. Changing one setting requires changing code. Deploying to a different environment requires rewriting. Sharing a prototype with someone else becomes nearly impossible.

Good configuration management means your code stays the same across environments and your configuration changes independently.

🟢 Pre-prototype habit:

List every setting that might change later (URLs, keys, timeouts, file paths) and commit to keeping them outside your codebase from the very first version.

2. Environment variables, configuration files, and when to use each

Most applications use a combination of:

Environment variables:

• Best for secrets or values that differ per deployment
• Easy to inject into containerized or cloud environments
• Not stored in source control

Configuration files (JSON, YAML, TOML):

• Great for structured, multi-value settings
• Better for defaults, non-sensitive options, and feature flags
• Can be versioned to document expected configuration

Local override files (.env.local, config.local.json):

• Allow personal settings without polluting team or production configs
• Should be kept out of version control

The key is keeping your application flexible. A prototype that works only on your machine is not a prototype; it’s a dead end.

🟢 Pre-prototype habit:

Decide which settings belong in environment variables and which belong in configuration files. Create a config layout before writing any functional code.

3. Secrets management: avoiding the classic mistakes

Secrets include API keys, database credentials, OAuth tokens, cloud access keys, and anything that could give access to systems or billing.

The most common mistakes vibe coders make:

• Putting secrets directly in source code
• Committing .env files to Git
• Embedding keys in configuration files checked into version control
• Storing keys in client-side JavaScript
• Uploading screenshots or videos that show secrets in terminal output

Instead, prototypes should do the following even at the earliest stages:

• Keep secrets only in environment variables or a secrets manager
• Make sure secrets never live in logs or print statements
• Rotate keys quickly if you think you exposed anything
• Give your app only the minimum permissions required to function

Even when you’re “just experimenting”, exposure of credentials can create real problems, especially with AI, cloud, and database services tied to billing.

🟢 Pre-prototype habit:

Plan where secrets will live before your prototype runs for the first time. At a minimum, decide your environment variable names and create a secure way to store or load them.

4. Handling configuration for AI-driven prototypes

AI applications often require more configuration than typical apps:

• Model names and versions
• Temperature, top-p, max tokens
• API provider base URLs
• Embedding dimensions
• Model-specific flags
• Memory or vector DB endpoints
• Retrieval parameters

If you hard-code these values, you lock your prototype to one model, one configuration, and one environment. You lose the ability to tune or compare options quickly.

With clean configuration management:

• You can switch between models in seconds
• You can compare model parameters or versions without code edits
• You avoid accidentally pushing production-level keys to your laptop
• You can safely share your prototype with collaborators

🟢 Pre-prototype habit:

Identify all AI and model parameters that might change as you experiment. Put every one of them in a config file from day one so testing variations is painless.

5. Documenting configuration expectations

Even for solo projects, documenting your configuration is essential.

At minimum, include:

• A sample config file (config.example.json or .env.example)
• A list of required environment variables
• An explanation of where secrets must be stored
• Clear defaults for non-secret configuration
• Notes on how to override settings locally

Documentation prevents confusion when you return to the prototype weeks later, and it allows you to hand the prototype to someone else with minimal friction.

🟢 Pre-prototype habit:

Create a config.example file before your first commit. Treat it as part of your project design, not an afterthought.

6. Quick pre-prototype checklist

Checklist Item	Why It Matters
Identify all settings that may vary	Ensures flexibility and prevents hard-coding
Separate secrets from configuration	Improves security and manageability
Use environment variables for sensitive values	Keeps secrets out of source control
Use config files for structured, non-sensitive options	Improves clarity and portability
Document configuration requirements	Makes prototypes shareable and easier to revisit
Avoid embedding secrets in logs, videos, or UI	Protects you from accidental leakage
Plan AI-specific configuration early	Makes experimentation easier

Closing note

Configuration and secrets management are not advanced topics. They are foundational habits that make your prototypes survivable. When you treat configuration separately from code and store secrets securely, your prototypes become portable, testable, and far safer to share or deploy.

🟢 Pre-prototype habit:

Before writing functional code, define your configuration categories, choose where secrets will live, and create your example config. These small steps will save you hours of refactoring later.