.env Questions

Avoiding .env for production is fine but certainly not a requirement nor a best practice. The point of the .env is two-fold:
Provide a way to differentiate settings across multiple environments, and provide a secure location (e.g. not included in version tracking) for sensitive data. If your variables you want to add fall into either of the categories I’d say it’s a good place. If you’re looking to use it simply as an easy way to load common settings I’d recommend using a
Config file instead, as they are only loaded on-demand and have a lot more flexibility as to what you can put in them.

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As for accessing variables, use the env() command you make it super easy.

https://codeigniter4.github.io/CodeIgnit...s.html#env

Also check out https://codeigniter4.github.io/CodeIgnit...ments.html