Separation of config settings for front-end and back-end

What do you think about conditionally loading certain configuration values based on their context? I noticed when documenting all the available site settings that many apply only to the site manager, while others apply to the front-end. There are some that cross the line, but logical separation would be only from the interface and SQL point of view. I think by reducing the size of the $modx->config array and returning only needed columns (especially in the front-end), we can improve performance of the parser at least slightly.

That sounds like a great idea to me. It’s always seemed crazy to me that all of those settings are available through the frontend. Are you thinking just add an available_in_frontend column to the site_settings table?

Not a bad idea, though I might shorten the column name a bit

While we’re at it, why don’t we just drop the settings tags altogether and make certain settings availabel as placeholders? It seems that it would simplify things a bit and it may even help our performance out a bit too. One less scrubbings of the output, right?

If this sounds good to everybody let me know and I’ll make a flyspray task.

Adam, I think we can flyspray it and always kill it later.

While we’re also in the merging/extending mood, Jared had a great insight that could save in performance across the board as well: http://modxcms.com/forums/index.php/topic,1290.msg8653.html#msg8653 I’m a fan of it in a big way.