YAML, Because XML is for Wussies

by Zef Hemel

Got that experience? The experience where you’re talking about XML with some of your friends or family and they look at you in that way. That “Gosh, you’re such a geek”-look. I haven’t had that experience, but you might have.

After talking to some of your close friends a bit more, you find out why they were giving you that look. “Don’t you know it man? XML is for wussies. Where have you been man?”

Wait, XML for wussies? But all those cool people like Don Box and Tim Bray live and breathe XML, what about them?

Apparantly, they’re not as cool as you thought. XML’s for people who were raised by angle brackets, it’s a fabricated world they live in. Damn. Who would’ve thought that? What should you do? And in particular, what should you do with your favourite shirt?

The real guys, so you learn—the ones that get all the chicks—use YAML. And YAML Ain’t Markup Language. Markup is like make-up. You don’t use make-up either, do you?

You computer geeks live in your own little world. With your brackets in their curly, square and angle shapes. You think you’re cool, don’t you? Let me show the difference between your geek world and the real YAML world:

Your shopping lists look like this:

<shoppinglist>
   <item>New hard drive (200Gb)</item>
   <item>Big-ass stereo</item>
   <item>Natural keyboard, without M$ keys</item>
</shoppinglist>

Our shopping lists look like this:

- Vegetables
- Macaroni
- Hooverphonic CDs

Your personal phonebook looks like this:

<phonebook>
   <person>
      <name>R. Stallman</name>
      <number>1 555 23223</number>
   </person>
   <person>
      <name>L. Torvalds</name>
      <number>1 555 728172</number>
   </person>
</phonebook>

Ours look like this:

# Phonebook of cool people
---
Name: Britney Spears
Phone: 1 232 32131
---
Name: Kevin Federline
Phone: 1 232 32131
---
Name: Christina Ricci
Phone: 1 232 54544
---
Name: Lindsay Lohan
Phone: 1 555 2847

I asked Britney Spears, full-time hot chick, and this is what she said:

Britney: “Yeah, I dig YAML, it’s so much better than XML. I even prefer it over Justin, oops, Jason, oops I did it again. I meant Kevin.”
Kevin: “That’s great, thanks Britney.”

That says it all. Welcome to cool people’s world.

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6 Commenti

  1. Hehe, nicely done.
    One problem with YAML doesn’t shock and awe ya with exact defenitions. You’ll end up with a lota flavors. Although.. I would prefer that format for config files

    #1 Bas Westerbaan

  2. Indeed, YAML is very nice for configuration files. It’s so much more convenient to type.

    #2 Zef

  3. Talking about config files, my favourite config file is the Max Payne 2 config file ’script’.

    // ————————————————————————-
    // Max Payne Menu Script
    // ————————————————————————-

    #include “..\database\stringdefines.h”
    #include “menuid.h”

    #define BG_BITMAP_MAINMENU “bitmaps\Menu_bg_Mainmenu.dds”
    #define BG_BITMAP_OPTIONS “bitmaps\Menu_bg_Generic.dds”
    #define BG_BITMAP_CROSSHAIRS “bitmaps\Menu_bg_Crosshairs.dds”
    #define BG_BITMAP_LOADSAVE “bitmaps\Menu_bg_LoadSave.dds”
    #define BG_BITMAP_QUIT “bitmaps\Menu_bg_Quit.dds”
    #define BG_BITMAP_HELPSCREEN “bitmaps\Menu_bg_Help.dds”

    [General]
    DefaultBackground = BG_BITMAP_OPTIONS;

    NormalFont = “..\sharedtextures\font_univers.tga”;
    NormalFontAlpha = “..\sharedtextures\font_univers_alpha.tga”;
    SelectedFont = “..\sharedtextures\font_univers_bright.tga”;

    ….

    // ————————————————————————-
    // Menu content script
    // ————————————————————————-

    [Menu]
    {
    [Properties]
    Name = “”;
    Headline = “”;
    Background = BG_BITMAP_MAINMENU;

    [Menu]
    {
    [Properties]
    Name = GCID_HELPSCREEN;
    ToolTip = GCID_HELPSCREEN_TIP;
    Headline = “”;
    Background = BG_BITMAP_HELPSCREEN;

    [Back]
    Name = “”;
    ToolTip = “”;
    ID = 0;
    }

    [Item]
    {
    [General]
    Name = GCID_RESUMEGAME;
    ToolTip = GCID_RESUMEGAME_TIP;
    ID = MENUID_ITEM_RESUME;
    }

    ….

    #3 Bas Westerbaan

  4. They even used a _cool_ recursive acronym! Yay, good for them!

    LMAO

    Next we’ll hear that VIM/Notepad is for wussies and we should all be using a hex editor to create your XHTML/XML files.

    #4 Raven Cecil

  5. I can empathise with those who would rather not type all of the required characters for XML, but it’s really just a data format. It should really only be the output and input between processes, not from the keyboard. That said, if you are hardcore enough to want to write raw XML yourself, you can get plenty of good IDEs and text editors that syntax highlight and indent/complete tags for you. Then you have all of the XML IDEs which do everything for you besides filling in the data. Some of them even do that.

    #5 an Anonymous Coward

  6. Lindsay has definately been overexposed lately and I think that’s going to hurt her career in the next year!

    #6 mr skin

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