[Catalyst] YAML vs. *

[Andrew Ford]

Matt S Trout wrote:
> Dean Troyer wrote:
>   
>> On 6/9/06, Matt S Trout <dbix-class at trout.me.uk> wrote:
>>     
>>> A few (IMO) better options -
>>>
>>> Config::General -
>>>
>>> <View TT>
>>>    INCLUDE_PATH __path_to('root')__
>>> </View>
>>>       
>> Too Apache-like...I've never cared for it because it can't make up
>> it's mind what kind of format it really is.
>>     
>
> Yes, it can. It's a kind of format designed to be reasonable for people to 
> write and machines to read.
>
> Sure, it loses points for architectural purity. But architectural purity gets 
> you YAML.
>   
I think a major problems is that often configuration file contents are 
not designed in anyway; they just evolve as a serialization of the 
information that the programmer happens to need to initialize the 
application (and often this will not be documented) and with no thought 
for the people who will have to deal with them.  For example there will 
probably be a dsn lurking in there somewhere, which will mean nothing to 
a lot of people, rather than separate database name, username and 
password that might make some sense to them (database type and such like 
can probably be assumed or defaulted and the application could build up 
the dsn).  So some poor support guy ends up getting told to edit a file 
that is undocumented, obtuse and has a fragile format, and then things 
break.

Andrew

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