crewai deploy parses .env differently than crewai run (quotes, inline comments, export lines)

Finding: In an external report (not reproduced by KFA), crewai deploy create/push on crewAI 1.15.23 (main), Windows 11, Python 3.13, venv, reads .env differently from crewai run, so a deployment can get different environment values than a local run. Source: https://github.com/crewAIInc/crewAI/issues/7861 Reported symptoms (https://github.com/crewAIInc/crewAI/issues/7861): with MODEL="gpt-4o-mini" in .env, deploy sends the value with the quotes included, while crewai run yields gpt-4o-mini without them. The reporter also says inline comments end up inside values, a line like 'export KEY=value' is sent as a key literally named 'export KEY', and a single line without '=' makes deploy send no env vars at all. No exact error message is given; the failure is silent value or key corruption. Reported cause (hypothesis, not maintainer-confirmed): the reporter says the parsing is in fetch_and_json_env_file in lib/cli/src/crewai_cli/utils.py, which uses a simple custom splitter, whereas crewai run uses python-dotenv. The reporter proposes using dotenv_values from python-dotenv, already a dependency. This is a proposal only. Status: the issue was open when captured, with no visible maintainer response and no linked PR. The reporter says they will open one, but that is an intention, not a fix. No fix commit or released fix is supported by the supplied sources, so the fix status is unknown/unfixed. Practical diagnosis: if a deployed crew misbehaves with model names or other settings that work under crewai run, compare the env values the deployment actually received with the local .env, looking for stray quotes, trailing inline comments, export prefixes, or malformed lines. This is a check derived from the report, not a verified procedure. Limitations: single external report; Windows-only environment; only the quoted case is described as a concrete repro; middle comments might be missing from the capture; the report was written with AI assistance. No workaround is confirmed by any source beyond the reporter's implied expectation, so none is offered. Freshness: created 2026-10-02, about 8 days before the 2026-10-10 capture.