Alternative format for the configuration file

[Nathaniel L. Budin]

On Tue, 27 Jul 2004, Otavio Salvador wrote:

> fe> and some  very  easy   to fetch variable    values with  a  dictionary
> fe> approach,  like   Cnf["APT::Get::Arch-Only"]  to get   the  value from
> fe> apt-get.conf.
> 
> The way to read the file is a lot easier since APT already does it and
> we can use this format without a parser but this, for a not so
> experiensed user, looks more complicated and long. This is what I
> think.

I'm not sure it'll be as easy as you think.  The most difficult part, IMO, 
of the current parser, was the variable configuration keys; for example, 
"filter_sarge" in a merge backend.  We'll still need to have those 
supported, which I doubt the parser for this format already supports.  
(Not that I've checked, but I don't imagine it would.)

> The configuration file looks very clear and flexible to me but I
> doesn't know how much this format will improve the flexibility. This
> is what we should think.

I also don't think this new format buys us very much in terms of 
flexibility.  True, the structure is hierarchical instead of flat, but I 
don't think a hierarchical format is necessary for a simple, one-task tool 
like debpartial-mirror.

As for compatibility with other apps - even if we switched to this format, 
I doubt you'd be able to use the same config files between APT and 
debpartial-mirror anyway, so I'm not sure where the perceived 
compatibility gain is coming from.

Nat