4 ms·

I'll be the first to ask: whats wrong with JSON?

mikegirouard 14y ago
IMHO, although it's very easily readable by humans, it's not quite as easily written by humans. I've always preferred INI over JSON for this reason.
- krapp 14y ago
  I would prefer INI over JSON as well except that JSON lets me nest arrays and INI doesn't. So this looks really nice. On the other hand I'd like to mix my data types as much as I darn well please.
knieveltech 14y ago
Nothing, json's awesome. But like most data packaging schemes the finished product isn't designed with human-readability as a primary goal. Edit: as mikegirouard points out it is much easier to read than (for example) serialized data, but still not as friendly as ini.
Lexarius 14y ago
Like JS from which it sprang, it lacks an integer type. Fortunately, parsers written for languages that do have integers can usually parse them correctly. (If you don't know why this might matter, try opening your browser's Javascript console and evaluating 10000000000000001) That's my peeve, though. I suspect that Tom is probably more concerned with readability. TOML also looks like it can be parsed a line at a time and doesn't really need to do any recursive parsing, so you could probably parse a stream of it as it arrives, which I imagine is trickier with JSON.
niggler 14y ago
I use it liberally, but the only thing that I find wrong with json is the [\u2028\u2029] issue: {"The invisible character":"really messes with javascript "} Copy the text and paste it in console.
- xnxn 14y ago
  Nitpick: that's an issue with JavaScript, not JSON.
  - niggler 14y ago
    I'd agree if JSON had a different name, but given that it is called "JavaScript Object Notation" on the main page (http://json.org/ http://json.org/) there's an implicit expectation that it's somehow related to javascript.
    - myhf 14y ago
      And there's an implicit expectation that JavaScript is somehow related to Java.
JulianMorrison 14y ago
No comments. Lack of essential data types, forcing you to make the contents of strings part of a hidden unspecified semantic (this parses as date, that parses as time, etc). Constrained by the limitations of JS floats (they aren't even bigdecimal). Excessive significant punctuation. Insignificant white space (permitting a difference between valid, and pretty-printed form). Looks like executable code and tempts you to parse it with eval.

IMHO, although it's very easily readable by humans, it's not quite as easily written by humans. I've always preferred INI over JSON for this reason.

krapp 14y ago
I would prefer INI over JSON as well except that JSON lets me nest arrays and INI doesn't. So this looks really nice. On the other hand I'd like to mix my data types as much as I darn well please.

knieveltech 14y ago

Nothing, json's awesome. But like most data packaging schemes the finished product isn't designed with human-readability as a primary goal. Edit: as mikegirouard points out it is much easier to read than (for example) serialized data, but still not as friendly as ini.

Lexarius 14y ago

Like JS from which it sprang, it lacks an integer type. Fortunately, parsers written for languages that do have integers can usually parse them correctly. (If you don't know why this might matter, try opening your browser's Javascript console and evaluating 10000000000000001) That's my peeve, though. I suspect that Tom is probably more concerned with readability. TOML also looks like it can be parsed a line at a time and doesn't really need to do any recursive parsing, so you could probably parse a stream of it as it arrives, which I imagine is trickier with JSON.

niggler 14y ago

I use it liberally, but the only thing that I find wrong with json is the [\u2028\u2029] issue: {"The invisible character":"really messes with javascript "} Copy the text and paste it in console.

xnxn 14y ago
Nitpick: that's an issue with JavaScript, not JSON.
- niggler 14y ago
  I'd agree if JSON had a different name, but given that it is called "JavaScript Object Notation" on the main page (http://json.org/ http://json.org/) there's an implicit expectation that it's somehow related to javascript.
  - myhf 14y ago
    And there's an implicit expectation that JavaScript is somehow related to Java.

JulianMorrison 14y ago

No comments. Lack of essential data types, forcing you to make the contents of strings part of a hidden unspecified semantic (this parses as date, that parses as time, etc). Constrained by the limitations of JS floats (they aren't even bigdecimal). Excessive significant punctuation. Insignificant white space (permitting a difference between valid, and pretty-printed form). Looks like executable code and tempts you to parse it with eval.