If the ifconfig output changes slightly, then it will probably break the thousands of ad-hoc parser implementations buried in scripts worldwide. With this appro

If the ifconfig output changes slightly, then it will probably break the thousands of ad-hoc parser implementations buried in scripts worldwide. With this approach, only a central parser library (open source) needs to be maintained so it can be fixed quickly and robustly. That being said, the goal is that command line tools that output useful data for scripts should have a structured output option like JSON while still keeping the human text output option so something like JC doesn’t even need to exist.