As per docker docs, environment variables in .env file expected to be in in key-val format as VAR=VAL which works fine for sample like foo=bar but no mention of unavoidable special characters e.g. '=', which may confuse for key-val separator OR space both part of valid db connection string as in:

secrets.env file:

 connectionString=Data Source=some-server;Initial Catalog=db;User ID=uid;Password=secretpassword

which is referred in docker-compose.debug.yaml file content as:

services:
  some-service:
    container_name: "service-name"
    env_file:
      - secrets.env
    ports:
      - "80:80"

Which is further used to transform into docker-compose.yaml as shown complete flow below:

So the question is - how do you include connection string which has = and Spaces as part of value ?

Need - We have few micro-services within VS solution and looking forward to avoid repetition of same connection strings otherwise needs in service spec of `docker-compose.yaml'

Tried including values in single/double quote but post transformation whatever after = is treated as value including quotes just similar like kubernets yaml file convention