Hi @paul-reeves_6112 ,
Of course, it should totally work in the usecase you described, I just wanted to explain how it got missed during testing :)
In general, we recommend not including configuration files that contain environment-specific configuration in artifacts to begin with, or at least using include/exclude filters on the Deploy Artifact operation. Then, deploying using the configuration files feature. But that's just general advice of course.
However, your use case sounds a little different, in that you want the configuration file deployed, but only the first time? I don't have a great solution to that, but the main downside I see is that engineers who manage/edit the configuration file (add values, etc), may be surprised when it's "not deploying" like they expect it to.
Config files can be tricky to balance as you probably already know :)
Cheers,
Alana