On 18-Jun-07, at 4:45 AM, Quentin Garnier wrote:
> The point is not XML.  The point is using proplib, so you don't  
> have to
> rewrite a fucking parser every time you add functionality or change  
> the
> syntax of the configuration.  XML is just a way of doing that,  
> which is
> well known and is used in a lot of other contexts.  But just any  
> proplib
> codec is fine.

Right. Using plists also allows us to build better tools to manage  
system configuration. Suppose Brett wants to extend the veriexec  
tools to manage this list. He don't need knowledge of the syntax of  
the entire file; he can load a veriexec dictionary from the master  
bootprops dictionary, massage it to his liking, and write it back.  
And it's easy from an application developer point of view.

Brett doesn't have to worry about screwing up the rest of the  
configuration, and at the same time the rest of us don't have to  
worry about his tools screwing up the rest of the configuration :-)

Users shouldn't have to edit config files. proplib enables us to  
build tools to move away from having to do this kind of crap. The  
fact that our plist format happens to be in a format that is easily  
modified with a text editor should be viewed as a feature, not a bug.

[Sorry for picking on you, Brett :-) veriexec is a great example of  
bootprops usage]

Cheers,
Jared