# Tips and Tricks

## Using a Config File For Settings

Many people like to have their configuration metadata available in a data file, rather than a Python program. This is easy to do with Paver:

    from paver.easy import *

    @task
    def auto():
        config_data = (read config data using config parser of choice)
        # assuming config_data is a dictionary
        options.update(config_data)

The auto task is automatically run when the pavement is launched. You can use Python’s standard ConfigParser module, if you’d like to store the information in an .ini file.