Subject: Re: XML config file
To: NetBSD Userlevel Technical Discussion List <tech-userlevel@netbsd.org>
From: Greg A. Woods <woods@weird.com>
List: tech-userlevel
Date: 07/23/2006 16:05:40
--pgp-sign-Multipart_Sun_Jul_23_16:05:38_2006-1
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable

At Fri, 21 Jul 2006 14:47:59 -0700,
Jason Thorpe wrote:
>=20
> Perhaps I've simply grown so used to it... I now actively DISLIKE the =20
> flat config files that BSD uses, because of their lack of structure :-)

Perhaps the ability to represent deeper and tree-like structure and is
nice, but XML (or anything SGML-related) really isn't the right answer
for adding any kind of structure to any file format intended to be used
by both humans and machine.

Just because it's commonly used for such purposes doesn't make it right
or good.

(the C-like syntax used by BIND and their ilk isn't really all that
great either of course, though it's a damn sight better than XML)

--=20
						Greg A. Woods

H:+1 416 218-0098 W:+1 416 489-5852 x122 VE3TCP RoboHack <woods@robohack.ca>
Planix, Inc. <woods@planix.com>       Secrets of the Weird <woods@weird.com>

--pgp-sign-Multipart_Sun_Jul_23_16:05:38_2006-1
Content-Type: application/pgp-signature
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: PGPfreeware 5.0i for non-commercial use
MessageID: hH3N1aiKTNs9iU4uI9ITvVsTGTeHo+o5

iQA/AwUBRMPWlGJ7XxTCWceFEQLX3QCfXre+EBgtyQH3luOjyRsiDT5FdYMAoNtn
qT2xiHjla6GqdThT15v04j7j
=zZyb
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

--pgp-sign-Multipart_Sun_Jul_23_16:05:38_2006-1--