System Variables

Most people don’t know why it’s extremely important to hide your project’s API keys. API keys and other sensitive information need to stay safe.

To keep project information private, you need to know how to access system variables. One of the most popular ways to create and use system variables is with .env files.

Prerequisites

Prerequisites

  • Python
  • Pip

Step-by-Step

  1. Install python-doten
    • In your terminal, type: 
      pip install python-dotenv
  2. Create an .env file

    • In your project directory, create a file with the name .env.

      .env file

  3. Copy and Paste

    • In your project file, copy the variable API Key and paste in .env file

      API KEY

  4. Import Libraries

    • Import load_dotenv from dotenv and os

      Import Libraries

  5. Call load_dotenv()

    • Will loads environment variables from dotenv

      load_dotenv()

  6. Get the value of variable

    • Use os.getenv('name_of_variable') to acess the value

      os.getenv('name_of_variable')

  7. Gitigore

    • If Doesnt exist a file with the name .gitignore, you need to create.

      gitignore

  8. .ENV

    • Inside of .gitignore add .env

      .env

  9. Commit
    • You already to commit safely.

Observation

If you had commited without hide your API keys, you will need follow this steps:

  1. Go to your project in Git CMD

  2. Type:

     git rm --cached .env

     git add .

     git commit -m ".update .gitignore and remove .env"