Configuration files will be optional and they will be read in following order:

• /etc/metastore.conf (system options)
• $HOME/.metastore.conf (global options)
• $CWD/.metastore.conf (local options)

The format will be most likely INI-like (key = value), but without any sections.

Options theoretically required to support current features:

• verbosity = INT - verbosity level (0 by default)
• mtime = BOOL - should mtime be considered when applying or diffing metadata? (no by default)
• empty-dirs = BOOL - recreate missing empty directories (no by default)
• git = BOOL - do not omit .git directories (no by default)
• file = STR - metadata file (.metadata by default)

Options required to support future features:

• format = STR - metadata file format (0 by default, v001t for new one)
• format-convert = BOOL - should metadata file be converted to chosen format even if present file uses other one? (no by default)
• exclude = STR - exclude dirs/files that match pattern (.git by default)
• exclude-from = STR - exclude dirs/files that match any pattern in file
• exclude-reset = BOOL - removes all excludes defined earlier using exclude when true
• exclude-from-reset = BOOL - removes all excludes defined earlier using exclude-from when true (no-op when false)
• remove-empty-dirs = BOOL - remove empty directories not present in applied metadata file (no by default)
• work-on-parameters = STR - parameters that should be considered when diffing or applying metadata ("mox" by default)

Some options theoretically required to support current features would be better not present at all. When exclude will be available, there will be no need for git, as it would complicate things more (ignoring .git directories being excluded...). Similarly work-on-parameters is much nicer than specific mtime.