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Centralised Connection String for multiple application asp.net

I have a web server with multiple application running. All the application have their web.config file. If the database password changes due to Policy I have to manually change the password in each of web.config files in the app setting section.
I was reading about the connection string setting in machine.config file.
Now my question is if I put connection string in appsetting section of machine.config with name ConnectionString and same in my web.config file will it overwrite the machine.config file values.
In my machine.config following is the setting
<configuration>
....
<appSettings>
<add key="ConnectionString" value="value"/>
</appSettings>
</configuration>
similarly in my web.config file
<configuration>
....
<appSettings>
<add key="ConnectionString" value="value"/>
</appSettings>
</configuration>
And I get the value in my code as below
string conString=ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["ConnectionString"];
will I get the overloaded value?

What's going to help you out here is to store your connection string(s) in .config file and then reference them either using the file="" attribute or the configSource="" attribute.
Here's an excellent question and answer that talks about the differences between the two and shows you how to implement them:
ASP.NET web.config: configSource vs. file attributes

Can't read Web.config with ConfigurationManager.AppSettings

I have build a WCF service that uses Web.config to get some appSettings. In visual studio it works great but when I publish and instal the service it suddenly gets its appSettings from App.config and not from Web.config.
I know this because I loop through appSettings and printed the result to the console with this code:
foreach (string key in ConfigurationManager.AppSettings.AllKeys)
{
Console.WriteLine("Name: {0} Value: {1}", key, ConfigurationManager.AppSettings[key]);
}
My configs look like this:
Web.config
....
<appSettings>
<add key="IQDir" value="C:\Program Files (x86)\Ridder iQ Client (lokaal)\Bin"/>
<add key="FileURL" value="localhost:8080/WebPortal_2.0/"/>
</appSettings>
....
App.config
....
<appSettings>
<add key="test1" value="wtf is going on!"/>
<add key="test2" value="waargh"/>
<add key="test3" value="I am getting a headache over here!!"/>
</appSettings>
....
When I run in visual studio I get:
But when I use the published code inside live environment I get this:
Why is this happening and how can I force ConfigurationManager to get appSettings from Web.config instead of App.config.

If you have a standard WCF-project, you should only have the Web.config-file, not App.config.
I would skip the old way of using appSettings altogether. Use applicationSettings instead, by using the Settings-tab in the project's properties.
It will create this in Web.Config:
<applicationSettings>
<Projectname.Properties.Settings>
<setting name="Testenvironment" serializeAs="String">
<value>True</value>
</setting>
</Projectname.Properties.Settings>
</applicationSettings>
For more information: appSettings vs applicationSettings. appSettings outdated?

configurationManager is used to pick values from the configuration file of project under which it is running. For example, you have exposed your wcf on web server S1 and you are consuming it in a console app from client machine M1. Now if your c# code is running on S1 then it will pick values from web.config from wcf code folder on S1. But if this code is running on client machine M1 (the console app consuming the service), then it will pick values from machine M1. What you are facing, normally happened after publish.

ConfigurationManager does not point to correct app.config

I am trying to use ConfigurationManager to get the connection string from a project call FileShareAccessLibrary.
This is the code I am writting in order to do this:
ConfigurationManager.ConnectionStrings["FileShareAccessLibrary"].ConnectionString
This is the content of app.Config
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<configuration>
<configSections></configSections>
<connectionStrings>
<add name="FileShareAccessLibrary" connectionString="......"
providerName="System.Data.SqlClient" />
<add name="FileShareAccessLibrary.Properties.Settings"
connectionString="..."
providerName="System.Data.SqlClient" />
</connectionStrings>
</configuration>
When I run my app I get a NullReferenceException because ConfigurationManager.ConnectionStrings["FileShareAccessLibrary"] returns null.
While debugging I noticed that none of the two connection strings are stored inside ConfigurationManager.ConnectionStrings so I figured that the ConfigurationManager is pointing to another file.
In my project I have not other app.config file.
Is there something I am doing wrong here?
Why is ConfigurationManager not getting my connection string?

If your FileShareAccessLibrary project is a class library rather than a windows forms application or console application then you will need to move the connection strings (and app settings if you have any) from the FileShareAccessLibrary config file to the config file of the application(s) that reference the FileShareAccessLibrary dll.

Can I store settings in a settings.config file in ASP.NET MVC?

I'm using .NET MVC
I have about 10 properties I want to store in a configuration file (.config etc.), related to environment/deployment stuff, + other things for quick changes without doing dLL deploys.
I'm using Team foundation service for CI builds etc, and my web.config is obviously under version-contrl.
What I'd like to do is have a settings.config (that's not in version control) file to store these, am I able to do this?
Or does it need to be in web.config?

To answer the title question, yes you can store settings in a separate config file, to do so you need to define the configSource property of appSettings element
E.g.
<appSettings configSource="settings.config" />
and in the settings.config file
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<appSettings>
<add key="settingKey" value="environmentValue" />
</appSettings>
However, for the sake of environment specific settings, you may want to look at config transforms. Setting up a transform config for each environment then deploying to that environment with the specified build configuration.
E.g. Web.Dev.config (provided you have setup a 'Dev' build configuration)
<configuration xmlns:xdt="http://schemas.microsoft.com/XML-Document-Transform">
<appSettings>
<add key="settingKey"
value="devEnvironmentValue"
xdt:Transform="SetAttributes" xdt:Locator="Match(key)"/>
</appSettings>
</configuration>
More details of build configuration and config transforms here: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd465318(v=vs.100).aspx
Or you could take advantage of TFS features and parameterize the environment variables, I don't have a lot of experience with this, but the following should help: http://ig.obsglobal.com/2013/02/tfs-and-continuous-deployment-part-4-parameterized-deployments/

Hiding private details from open source projects

I have a .net github project that is basically a wrapper around a web API. In the test project, I am calling to the API using an API key. I need to keep this key private, how do I accomplish this in a visual studio project?
In some other projects, like python, I can have git ignore the file (config.py) and use something like config.example.py. But in visual studio's case, the project will not compile because of the missing file Config.cs. What is the proper way to solve this? I'm thinking of using this same method of ignoring the file and have them execute a build script that should rename Config.example.cs to Config.cs?

This is the perfect for .config files. Depending on whether its a web or console application, you will have a web.config or app.config file in your project.
You can use the appSettings section to store your API key.
To make things even easier, you can actually have this section read from another file, ie: specialappsettings.config and then just ignore that single file from your repository.
Modify your web.config (or app.config):
<configuration>
<appSettings file="specialappsettings.config">
</appSettings>
<system.web>
<!-- standard web settings go here -->
</system.web>
</configuration>
Create a new specialappsettings.config file:
<appSettings>
<add key="APIKey" value="YourApiKeyValue" />
<add key="AnotherKey" value="AnotherValue" />
</appSettings>
This can be accessed in your code via:
var apiKey = ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["APIKey"];
Notes:
You can keep your settings within the original web.config file as
well but this lets you ignore just the specific settings file from
your git repository without affecting the rest of the project's
necessary configuration details.
The same "key" can be saved in
either file however the external file will override the original
web.config file value.

You are probably looking for the App.config file for a project. It will be copied to <application>.exe.config when you compile it. Users can edit that config file as needed.
In that config file, you can add your API keys:
<configuration>
<appSettings>
<add key="APIKey" value="12345"/>
</appSettings>
</configuration>
Then you can access it from your code using ConfigurationManager.AppSettings:
string apiKey = ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["APIKey"];

One option is to use .config files instead of having secret keys hardcoded in sources.
More info Using Settings in C# and step-by-step guide
<configuration>
<appSettings>
<add key="SecretKey" value="0" />
</appSettings>
</configuration>
var secretKey = ConfigurationManager.AppSettings.Get("SecretKey");

Perhaps you can store the key outside of the Config.cs file and load it at run time.
Bonus, other people using your code won't have to recompile the project to change to their API key.