[Discuss] Application config files

[Steve Litt]

On Fri, 12 Jul 2019 16:16:15 -0500
Derek Martin <invalid at pizzashack.org> wrote:

> On Fri, Jul 12, 2019 at 02:07:20PM -0400, Steve Litt wrote:
> > On Fri, 12 Jul 2019 13:40:01 -0400
> > Dan Ritter <dsr at randomstring.org> wrote:
> >   
> > > Jerry Feldman wrote:   
> > > > I have an application that I wrote where I am using a .ini style
> > > > file for config. I chose that as an afterthought but maybe JSON,
> > > > YAML, or TOML might be better formats.  
> 
> > JSON is out from the get-go: It's not meant to be read and written
> > by humans.  
> 
> I largely disagree.  If it's currently in INI format the equivalent
> JSON should generally be perfectly human-readable, e.g.:
> 
{"thingy": {"name":  "foo","ip": "10.1.2.3", "value": 1,
"live":  true, "notes": null}}

Your assertions (not copied here) about Python writing beautful
json is true, but humans, not so much. One could easily write a Python
json beautifier to help, but I still think complex json is hard for a
human to edit.

I think about 20 lines of Python could turn an .ini file into a list of
dicts.

SteveT

Steve Litt 
July 2019 featured book: Troubleshooting Techniques
     of the Successful Technologist
http://www.troubleshooters.com/techniques