YAML syntax¶

This is an introduction to the most common YAML constructs. For more detailed information, see PyYAML documentation, which this article is based on, Chapter 2 of the YAML specification or the Wikipedia page.

YAML is a data serialization format designed for human readability. YAML is a recursive acronym for “YAML Ain’t Markup Language”.

YAML is similar to JSON, and in fact, JSON is a subset of YAML 1.2; but YAML has some more advanced features and is easier to read. However, it is also more difficult to parse (and probably somewhat slower). Data is stored in mappings (associative arrays), sequences (lists) and scalars (single values). Data structure hierarchy depends either on indentation (block context, similar to Python code), or nesting of brackets and braces (flow context, similar to JSON). YAML comments begin with # and continue until the end of line.

Documents¶

A YAML stream consists of one or more documents starting with --- and optionally ending with ... . --- can be left out for the first document.

Single document with no explicit start or end:

- Red
- Green
- Blue

Same document with explicit start and end:

---
- Red
- Green
- Blue
...

A stream containing multiple documents:

---
- Red
- Green
- Blue
---
- Linux
- BSD
---
answer : 42

Sequences¶

Sequences are arrays of nodes of any type, similar e.g. to Python lists. In block context, each item begins with hyphen+space “- ”. In flow context, sequences have syntax similar to D arrays.

#Block context
- Red
- Green
- Blue

#Flow context
[Red, Green, Blue]

#Nested
-
  - Red
  - Green
  - Blue
-
  - Linux
  - BSD

#Nested flow
[[Red, Green, Blue], [Linux, BSD]]

#Nested in a mapping
Colors:
  - Red
  - Green
  - Blue
Operating systems:
  - Linux
  - BSD

Mappings¶

Mappings are associative arrays where each key and value can be of any type, similar e.g. to Python dictionaries. In block context, keys and values are separated by colon+space ”: ”. In flow context, mappings have syntax similar to D associative arrays, but with braces instead of brackets:

#Block context
CPU: Athlon
GPU: Radeon
OS: Linux

#Flow context
{CPU: Athlon, GPU: Radeon, OS: Linux}

#Nested
PC:
  CPU: Athlon
  GPU: Radeon
  OS: Debian
Phone:
  CPU: Cortex
  GPU: PowerVR
  OS: Android

#Nested flow
{PC: {CPU: Athlon, GPU: Radeon, OS: Debian},
 Phone: {CPU: Cortex, GPU: PowerVR, OS: Android}}

#Nested in a sequence
- CPU: Athlon
  GPU: Radeon
  OS: Debian
- CPU: Cortex
  GPU: PowerVR
  OS: Android

Complex keys start with question mark+space ”? ”.

#Nested in a sequence
? [CPU, GPU]: [Athlon, Radeon]
OS: Debian

Scalars¶

Scalars are simple values such as integers, strings, timestamps and so on. There are multiple scalar styles.

Plain scalars use no quotes, start with the first non-space and end with the last non-space character:

scalar: Plain scalar

Single quoted scalars start and end with single quotes. A single quote is represented by a pair of single quotes ‘’.

scalar: 'Single quoted scalar ending with some spaces    '

Double quoted scalars support C-style escape sequences.

scalar: "Double quoted scalar \n with some \\ escape sequences"

Block scalars are convenient for multi-line values. They start either with | or with >. With |, the newlines in the scalar are preserved. With >, the newlines between two non-empty lines are removed.

scalar: |
  Newlines are preserved
  First line
  Second line

scalar: >
  Newlines are folded
  This is still the first paragraph

  This is the second
  paragraph

Anchors and aliases¶

Anchors and aliases can reduce size of YAML code by allowing you to define a value once, assign an anchor to it and use alias referring to that anchor anywhere else you need that value. It is possible to use this to create recursive data structures and some parsers support this; however, D:YAML does not (this might change in the future, but it is unlikely).

Person: &AD
  gender: male
  name: Arthur Dent
Clone: *AD

Tags¶

Tags are identifiers that specify data types of YAML nodes. Most default YAML tags are resolved implicitly, so there is no need to specify them. D:YAML also supports implicit resolution for custom, user specified tags.

Explicitly specified tags:

answer: !!int "42"
name:   !!str "Arthur Dent"

Implicit tags:

answer: 42        #int
name: Arthur Dent #string

This table shows D types stored in yaml.Node default YAML tags are converted to. Some of these might change in the future (especially !!map and !!set).

YAML tag	D type
!!null	yaml.YAMLNull
!!bool	bool
!!int	long
!!float	real
!!binary	ubyte[]
!!timestamp	datetime.SysTime
!!map, !!omap, !!pairs	Node.Pair[]
!!seq, !!set	Node[]
!!str	string

Navigation