Some examples of use (mis-use?) cases for making settings accessible to templates:
1. To avoid hard coding media url domains in your templates when you're moving between different test and production server setups. 2. To use, for example, the ADMIN_EMAIL setting in a generic error template that is used across multiple sites, without having to create a custom view just for that purpose. I find the settings file a convenient place to store a bunch of custom per-site settings, such as site name, that can be used in generic templates. Kieran
