Working with Environment Variables in Ruby

Environment variables are a crucial part of web application development, allowing developers to manage configuration data and sensitive information such as API credentials in a secure and efficient manner. By leveraging environment variables, developers can separate their code from specific settings, making it easier to deploy and maintain applications across different environments. Ruby on Rails provides a built-in `ENV` object that allows developers to access and manipulate environment variables within their code. The use of environment variables is particularly useful when working with external services or APIs, as they enable the secure storage and management of credentials. Tools like dotenv can simplify the process of setting environment variables in development, while configuration management tools, containerization solutions, and service providers offer more comprehensive options for managing environment variables in production.