Alternative to hardcoding usernames and passwords - asp.net-mvc

Question

I am writing an MVC4 app using C# Razor and all that great stuff. It has full login and password along with an extra 2 questions required before the user can login.
Before I enabled the login feature several months back, it was a dream, I just start the app on the page I was interested in, and it loads away allowing me to instantly see my results.
Occasionally I would start on the wrong page and god forbid I might have to do an extra click or two to get to the right page. I considered this bad enough.
Now that I have enabled the login and since done several modifications to the code, it has been through the testing department, and out to the big bad world. I am not allowed to disable it again.
My alternative was to essentially hardcode the testing username and password and pin with the other default values required and then remove them upon release. Thank god for testing...I actually left them hardcoded once. This was enough to teach me the lesson never to do it again.
However, I start my application literally without exaggeration possibly hundreds (although it feels like thousands) of times a day and every single time I have to fill in this dreaded login form. this is extremely unproductive and really uses up a lot of my time. It actively encourages me to do bad programming habits of changing several things at once and then testing. A road I don't want to start down.
My question: Is there an alternative to this hardcoding practice that will let me get back my productivity?
Please don't suggest allowing the browser to remember the details. I tried, the problem is that my app must be cross browser and platform compatible which means it not only has to run in windows browsers (which has enough variation in themselves), but also on tablets, phones and even lunix and macs. So relying on the browser to remember the details is simply not an option.
Any suggestions.
Based on suggestions below I decided to explore the web/user.config route, here are my attempts so far which are not working.
Model:
public class LogOnModel
{
[Required]
[Display(Name = "User name")]
[StringLength(255, ErrorMessage = "The {0} must be at least {2} characters long.", MinimumLength = 8)]
public string UserName { get; set; }
[Required]
[DataType(DataType.Password)]
[Display(Name = "Password")]
[StringLength(255, ErrorMessage = "The {0} must be at least {2} characters long.", MinimumLength = 6)]
public string Password { get; set; }
}
Controllers:
public ActionResult Login()
{
LogOnModel model = new LogOnModel();
model.UserName = ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["UserName"];
model.Password = ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["Password"];
return View("Login");
}
[HttpPost]
public ActionResult Login(LogOnModel model, string returnUrl)
{
model.UserName = ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["UserName"];
model.Password = ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["Password"];
//I am aware that this will presently overwrite the incoming model if it exists.
//I am just trying to get something work here and I will surround it with an if afterward.
if (ModelState.IsValid)
{
... Other code here
}
... Other code here (there are a variety of returns this is a long method with lots of checks
}
View:
#model YeatsClinical.PatientPortal.Web.Models.LogOnModel
...Lots of other code...
#Html.TextBoxFor(x=>x.UserName, new { #class = "m-wrap placeholder-no-fix", #placeholder="Username"})
...Lots of other code...
I didn't bother trying the password yet, I just wanted to get one thing working first.
Web.Config:
<appSettings file="user.config">
User.Config
<appSettings>
<add key="UserName" value ="someone#somewhere.com"/>
<add key="Password" value ="password"/>
</appSettings>
There are no longer any web/user.config errors or any build errors. It just loads a nicely formatted textbox with the placeholder text as before. So where am I going wrong. Thanks again everyone.

Answer 1

Put your login details in your local web.config file. Your code will look for the config values, and if there, will auto-fill them in for you. You can leave this code in when you deploy - since those values are not in the config file in production, you won't have to worry about it running there.
Or you can put them in a separate config file, like user.config, and reference that in your main config. Your user.config file will never be published. Just make sure your deployment practice doesn't bring this file in.
Web.config:
<configuration>
<appSettings file="user.config">
<!-- put your normal config values here -->
</appSettings>
</configuration>
user.config (only your local machine - not in source control, and not on the server)
<appSettings>
<add key="defaultUser" value ="someUser"/>
<add key="defaultPassword" value ="somePassword"/>
</appSettings>
Another alternative might be to use conditional compilation, assuming you're in debug mode locally and release in release mode.
#if DEBUG
PopulateTheUserCredentials();
#endif