aridity

The Arid Manifesto

Paths as keys to avoid key concatenation
It's never necessary to repeat a value
Minimal syntax for surprise-free authoring
Lazy context-sensitive evaluation
Strongly (dynamically) typed values
Central defaulting rather than at call sites
Templating using same syntax as expressions
Easy to correctly quote/escape values in templates
Extensibility via user-defined functions
Easy tasks are easy, hard tasks are possible
Many applications can share one user config
Principle of least astonishment driven design
Don't make users jump through hoops

Config file syntax

: Until aridity gets support for comments, you can use the colon directive to ignore data.
: Directives MUST be separated from data by whitespace, and are typically punctuation.

: Here's the equals directive:
foo = bar
: This does what you'd expect - assign the string value bar to foo.
: foo is actually a path of length 1, path components are whitespace-separated:
this is a path = this is a value
: Any existing assignment can be overridden:
foo = baz
this is a path = this is different

: Internal whitespace in values is preserved (leading and trailing whitespace is not):
two sentences = Some like 2 spaces.  After a full stop.

: You can use indentation to avoid typing a common path prefix multiple times:
app1 feature1
    data1 = value1
    data2 = value2
app2
    feature1 data = value3
    feature2
        data1 = value4
        data2 = value5
: Exactly the same effect without using indentation:
app1 feature1 data1 = value1
app1 feature1 data2 = value2
app2 feature1 data = value3
app2 feature2 data1 = value4
app2 feature2 data2 = value5

: The right hand side of an equals is actually an expression.
: In an expression, a dollar sign with brackets can be used to refer to another path:
has value
    bar = $(foo)
    value3 = $(app2 feature1 data)
: Round brackets and square brackets have exactly the same effect:
also has value bar = $[foo]
: Values can be concatenated:
two bars
    without spacing = $(foo)$(foo)
    with one space  = $(foo) $(foo)
    with 2 spaces   = $(foo)  $(foo)
: A few paths are predefined in every new context, such as:
home directory = $(~)

: To get a literal dollar there is a special form for quoting:
financial report = $'(We lost $100 on Friday.)
: Be careful with nested brackets, the first matching bracket ends the special form:
behaviour
    expected   = $'[Lunch cost $20 (worth it though).]
    unexpected = $'(Lunch cost $20 (worth it though).)

: Another special form can be used to preserve leading/trailing whitespace:
padded bars = $.( $(foo) $(foo) )
: Brackets can span multiple lines:
bar per line
    without final newline = $.($(foo)
$(foo))
    with final newline = $.($(foo)
$(foo)
)

: Evaluation is lazy, the expression is what is actually (and eagerly) assigned to the path:
no problem = $(this path will get a value later)
: If your use-case demands it, you can force eager evaluation:
bar even if foo changes later := $(foo)

: When evaluating a path the local context is examined first, then its parents if path not found:
host
    short path = nope
    guest short path = yep
    should be nope = $(short path)
    guest should be yep = $(short path)
does not work = $(short path)

: Use the dot directive to include config from another file:
. /path/to/other/config.arid
: Thus you can factor out any config that's common to multiple deployments, and override as needed.
: It's possible (but maybe not so useful) to include under a non-trivial path:
other stuff . /path/to/other/config.arid
: There is no default context for relative paths, you must set cwd up-front as inclusion is not lazy:
cwd = /path/to
. other/config.arid

: Text between dollar and open bracket (that isn't a special form) is a function name.
: A useful function predefined in every new context is the platform slash:
path = $/($(~) Desktop report.txt)
: Unlike most functions, / can also be used (less legibly) as a value:
path = $(~)$(/)Desktop$(/)report.txt
: All functions are first class objects that can be assigned and overridden in the usual ways:
slash := $(/)
/ = something else
path = $slash($(~) Desktop report.txt)

: Simple lists can be created using the plus equals convenience directive.
: Indentation means you don't have to repeat the directive for every list element:
years +=
    2018
    2019
years += 2020
: A predefined join function takes a list and a separator and does what you'd expect:
copyright = $join($(years) $.(, ))
: Observe that functions typically take values not identifiers, so you have to 'get' explicitly.
: Lists are just a special case of nested contexts, which are much more powerful:
person
    $.(The Guardians) year = 2018
    Greta year = 2019
summary = Person of the Year was $join($map($(person) $.($label() in $(year))) $.(, )).
: Here the predefined label function gives you access to the last path component of a list element.

Templates

A template is simply an expression in a file, that may be quite large
These are typically used to create config files for other languages e.g. YAML, HCL
- Note that literal dollar signs must be quoted as above, everything else is safe
A processtemplate script is provided for basic processing

processtemplate app.json.aridt <config.arid >app.json

Conventionally the " path is set to the most useful escape function for the target format
- Brackets can be elided in function composition e.g. $"$(key) is the same as $"($(key))

Metadata

Release files for aridity 22

For a detailed explanation of source distributions (sdists) and built distributions (wheels), please see the package formats documentation.

Source distribution (sdist)

Source distribution for aridity 22
File	Size	Uploaded
aridity-22.tar.gz	12.9 kB	May 8, 2020	Details

Built distribution (wheel)

Table of built distributions (wheels) for aridity 22
File	Interpreter	ABI	Platform	Reset
aridity-22-py2.py3-none-any.whl 32.4 kB May 8, 2020	Python 3, Python 2	none	any	Details

Total release size: 45.3 kB

Release files / aridity-22.tar.gz

Download URL	aridity-22.tar.gz
Size	12.9 kB
Tags	Source
SHA-256 checksum How to use checksums	`206b96b9e2329825fb561654ccc1ea1d2c8102cfaeb1fc12566f6f9576f4abd4`
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Upload date	May 8, 2020
Uploaded using Trusted Publishing? What is trusted publishing?	No
Uploaded via	`twine/3.1.1 pkginfo/1.5.0.1 requests/2.23.0 setuptools/46.1.3 requests-toolbelt/0.9.1 tqdm/4.45.0 CPython/3.6.9`

Release files / aridity-22-py2.py3-none-any.whl

Download URL	aridity-22-py2.py3-none-any.whl
Size	32.4 kB
Tags	Python 2 Python 3
SHA-256 checksum How to use checksums	`d4b3896a41c932ead42634fb2b1df43c5518e5094dc59f6490943fc706566667`
BLAKE2b-256 checksum How to use checksums	`0f8bba854e3745eb7010d37b602a8940c9b161ff345f73ec68280acae957ec4e`
Upload date	May 8, 2020
Uploaded using Trusted Publishing? What is trusted publishing?	No
Uploaded via	`twine/3.1.1 pkginfo/1.5.0.1 requests/2.23.0 setuptools/46.1.3 requests-toolbelt/0.9.1 tqdm/4.45.0 CPython/3.6.9`