Re: sysinst split project - The Configuration File

[Thor Lancelot Simon <tls%panix.com@localhost>]

On Mon, Dec 14, 2009 at 04:32:13PM -0600, David Young wrote:
> 
> Jean-Yves,
> 
> Most of the existing XML tools are too CPU- and memory-intensive, I
> agree, but NetBSD happens to be the center for improvements.

Nonetheless, this seems like an application where people are likely to
have to edit the configuration files by hand.  I would like to register,
again, my strong objection to using XML -- or any other format which has
XML's repugnant feature of token delimiters with semantic meaning, which
is about as bad for human usability as possible -- in any application in
NetBSD in which it may be reasonably expected that humans will have to or
choose to hand-edit the chosen data format.

XML is fine for many purposes.  Not, please, for any purposes in which
human beings are likely to end up editing by hand.

Having to recursively do _semantic_ procesing just to figure out where the
boundaries of the data elements are is a syntactical decision only a
standards committee could love.

Thor