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Alternative to JSON and XML?

Caleb Gingles · 2014-12-15T19:29:02

Currently, in my game, I use XML for most of my data files. Not because I particularly like XML, but because the library I'm using (PugiXML) is particularly friendly. However, because the files are XML, they feel rather unwieldy to edit. In the past I tried switching to JSON. Ignoring the fact that I couldn't find a C++ JSON parsing library that didn't spit out tons of compiler warnings, I found JSON to be just as annoying to use as XML. My primary interest in JSON was that it was a simpler format, and seemed to have less extraneous text required to be a valid and easily-readable file. However, after using it, I found that to not be the case. The entire contents of the file has to be surrounded in curly braces. Not a big deal, but bothers me as it feels unnecessary. I don't care about it being parseable by Javascript, I just want it to hold some data from my game, that only my game will look at. I can't just dive in, create a new file, I first have to start with the curly braces to make it valid. All variable names have to be surrounded by quotes. If the file is a decent size, pretty soon all you see is a big sea of quotes. They add noise and extra work to what should otherwise be a simple layout. JSON is very strict about commas. If you create an array of items, every item must end with a comma, EXCEPT for the very last item, which must NOT end with a comma. It is very common fro me to get parse errors because I added or removed something from an array, and didn't notice that the commas were wrong. I recently found this blog post which gives pretty much the same list, and shows an example of an alternative layout. I think the result he comes up with is pretty good. If there was a library to parse that format, I'd use it. But I think it could be taken even further. Considering that this is for storing data for a game to use, I don't remotely care about any features that exist for the sake of Javascript or the web. All I need is a list of key-value pairs, where the value could be a single value or an array. Something like this (as a random example): name "Test model" // Simple key-value pair version 1.0 // Numeric values are allowed geometry { // Value is an array vertices { 0, 0, 0 // Array of values. No key given, so accessible by index position 1, 0, 0 // Another array of values, also accessible by index 1, 1, 0 // ... 0, 1, 0 // ... } indices 0, 1, 2, 2, 3, 0 // Value is an array. Array values are inline, so don't need curly braces. } To me (and I know this is personal opinion), this format looks great. Simple, no extra characters, easy to understand and write. So, I guess I'm wondering: Why do most people seem to be using XML or JSON for their data files? In the context of writing a game, where you don't need to communicate with an external piece of software, it seems like overkill. Does there already exist a file format (and accompanying library) that is extremely simple, like what I've written here? If not, I may have to write it myself, but no sense rewriting something that already exists.