YAML

YAML stands for ‘YAML Ain’t Markup Language’ and is a data serialization language, widely used to written configuration files.

The configuration files can have two different possible extensions: .yml or .yaml

Example File

# Comments can be inserted using '#'
# Different Boolean options: true, false, yes, no, on, off
 
# Key-value pair
access_enable: yes
 
# Object (Dict)
microservice:
	app: user-authentication
	port: 9000
	version: 1.7
 
# List
users:
	- user001
	- user002
	- user003
 
# List of objects
microservices:
  - app: user-authentication
    port: 9000
    version: 1.7
    deployed: true
  - app: shopping-cart
    port: 8080
    version: 1.2
    deployed: off
 
# Multi line strings
data:
	multiLineString: |
	    SELECT name, last_name, grade, age
	    FROM students
	    WHERE age > 18
	    ORDER BY last_name ASC;
	sameLineLongString: >
	    this is a single 
	    line, but for better
	    read experience we can
	    breakdown the string

Other Features

• Is possible to use $VARIABLE_NAME for accessing environment variables
• YAML has placeholder features
• The --- can be used for separate YAML configurations in the same file

Handling With Code

Python

import yaml
 
 
def load_config(file_path):
    with open(file_path, "r") as file:
        config = yaml.safe_load(file)
    return config