[Catalyst] YAML vs. *

[Kiki]

Matt S Trout wrote:
> I love YAML as a serialisation format for data transfer, but so far as stuff 
> like config files that are designed for human write / machine read, I 
> personally think it sucks. Massively.
>
> And for hysterical raisins it's currently our default config file formats, and 
> I see users running into trouble getting their myapp.yml to parse right all 
> the flipping time. So, I'm wondering if this is just me being a YAML-hating 
> heretic or if other people are of the same opinion.
>   
OK, bikeshed painting time....

Decision-taking offtopical $0.02: I recently read a book in which the
author suggests to have people make preference lists and choose the most
common _second_ choice listed, based on the theory that people would put
their (sometimes/mostly unreasonable) "pet" choice first and the most
reasonable choice after that. Of course it would require either honest
choices or the people involved not to be aware of the selection process ...

Here would be my preference list (based on actual usage in the apps I
maintain):
1. YAML: yes, the whitespace/indent issue is pretty frustrating, apart
from that no complaints, simple configs are easy to parse (and to write
once you take care of proper indentation/no tabs), complex configs are
possible
2. INI: is even easier to write/read than yaml, widely understood and
all, but alas, unable to express more complex data structures (actually
I use a similar module which uses "." as a special key separator char to
provide for deeper hashes. Arrays could be expressed by repeating the
last key)
3. Apache-style: OK, but ..., lack of explicit key/value separator kinda
confusing, xml style closing </Tag> makes it a bit too verbose for my
own liking. also how do you express deeper hashes, did I miss that?
4. JSON: never used it so it gets the last place .... as somebody said
before, looks like a subset of yaml with more separators and less
whitespace nazism

Then again, how about providing a config converter (for conversions that
make sense, usually simple config -> more complex ones, ini/apache ->
yaml/json): catalyst_config.pl --convert_to json myapp.ini

For tutorials and (simple) config examples, simple, widely known and
robust is better, therefore INI-style would be the best choice. Apache
style second (not as widely known)

For defaults when generating an new app, perhaps a switch to specify
default format, with default format value same as the one used in
tutorials so as not to confuse newbies, and even if you forgot to
specify one you could use the conversion tool...