Birbla

Join the discussion

Write your take first — we'll ask for email only when you're ready to publish.

Sign in
  • Hacker News
  • Put quotes around your strings an you'll be mostly fine.
    by elfrinjo
  • - "something broke" is way better than stack traces with line numbers

    That sums it up. Its the same since the days of XML. Someone decides to make something configurable externally and then everything gets put in there for convenience. Now we are programming in XML/YAML without even a stack trace (or a debugger, or call hierarchy, or type checking or ... )

    by discreteevent
  • Ctrl+F "KYAML", 0 results

    I think KYAML[1] is very relevant here. KYAML is a strict subset of yaml[2], supported natively by kubernetes tooling in most recent versions.

    In my opinion it's closer to JSON with comments than to YAML, but overall it looks like a pretty nice format, that solves some of pain points of both technologies. This is not the first nor the only JSON-with-comments format, so I wonder if it manages to break out of kubernetes world and become popular.

    [1] https://kubernetes.io/blog/2026/08/11/how-to-pretty-print-ku...

    [2] https://www.kubernetes.dev/resources/keps/5295/

    by ishouldnotbutk8
  • My usage of YAML has been limited. For the times I have used it (kubenetes, docker compose, other things, etc) -- I don't get what it so special about it.

    It just seems reinventing the wheel again and again.

    I am not suggesting JSON is perfect, either. However I do prefer it to YAML (and XML) by a mile.

    It's a shame s-expressions never taken off.

      (select (id name)
    (:from users)
    (:where (= name "Peter")))
    Or

      (orders
    (order
      (id 1)
      (code "aa1")
      (qty 32)))
    I know - its a sample, but you get it. :-)
    by masfoobar
  • I'm still sad that JSON5 never became industry standard.

    Unlike hjson, toml and many others, JSON5 didn't try to reinvent the wheel and create a totally new syntax.

    Instead, they took 2 already well established standards (JSON and ECMAScript 5.1) and put them together.

    I think that it is pleasant enough to write by hand while not creating yet another new syntax that you have to get used to.

    [0] https://json5.org/

    by vova_hn2
  • Surprised TOML didn't get mentioned in the alternatives section, it's probably my favourite configuration format.

    I'm working on a project now that uses YAML for configuration (it makes more sense in this context than TOML) and am parsing it using Rust's `serde` crate (via `serde_norway`). It's not so bad if you use `#[serde(deny_unknown_fields)]` everywhere.

    by NoboruWataya
  • chuckle

    Well most of that is due to 1.1 which has been deprecated god knows for how long.

    1.2 does not have the 'Norway' problem any more.

    Tooting my own horn, this is how a modern YAML library looks like nowadays:

    https://github.com/pantoniou/libfyaml

    by fypanto
  • There is no problem with YAML, just like there was no problem with XML at all. The problem is with the software devs who use it for the wrong thing. I just wonder why JSON doesn't get all the hate, while it is a terrible format also: it is not streamable (YAML is), it doesn't have comments... and non-standard workarounds are used for these features. Norway better than YAML, in my opinion.
    by fodkodrasz

Explore Birbla archives