Alternatives to XML?

[Chris Angelico]

On Thu, Aug 25, 2016 at 9:23 PM, Frank Millman <frank at chagford.com> wrote:
>
> At the risk of disappointing some of you, this is how I am going to proceed.
>
> 4. As I have said already, for good or ill, I am comfortable with my current
> use of XML, so I do not have a pressing need to change to anything else. The
> problem that prompted this thread was the issue of storing '<' and '>' in
> attributes. I have come up with a simple workaround - pass the XML through a
> function between the database and the gui, converting from '>'  to '>' in
> one direction, and back to '>' in the other. It works.

Should be fine, as long as the actual XML file has < in it. It
won't disappoint me at all, if the XML file is (primarily) a transport
format between programs; just make sure it's always valid XML, rather
than some "XML-like" file structure. In a greenfield project, I would
advise strongly against this, but since you already have something to
work with, it's not worth changing everything up.

Know that every decision has consequences, and make your decisions
with open eyes. I'm not disappointed by someone who, with greater
knowledge of the situation and the likely consequences of various
choices, chooses something different from what I, from thousands of
miles away, recommended :)

ChrisA