How do you structure config data in a database?

Question

What is people\'s prefered method of storing application configuration data in a database. From having done this in the past myself, I\'ve utilised two ways of doing it.

Answer 1

I've used both 1 and 2 in the past, and I think they're both terrible solutions. I think Option 2 is better because it allows typing, but it's a lot more ugly than option 1. The biggest problem I have with either is versioning the config file. You can version SQL reasonably well using standard version control systems, but merging changes is usually problematic. Given an opportunity to do this "right", I'd probably create a bunch of tables, one for each type of configuration parameter (not necessarily for each parameter itself), thus getting the benefit of typing and the benefit of the key/value paradigm where appropriate. You can also implement more advanced structures this way, such as lists and hierarchies, which will then be directly queryable by the app instead of having to load the config and then transform it somehow in memory.