Before we implement SDL package format for DUB

[via Digitalmars-d]

On Friday, 29 August 2014 at 20:54:49 UTC, Idan Arye wrote:
> I would now like to invoke the Zero One Infinity 
> Rule(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero_one_infinity_rule).
>
> Supporting one format makes sense - DUB can simply use the set 
> of functions and data structures provided by Phobos or by 
> external libraries for using this format.
>
> Supporting two formats will require two sets of functions and 
> data structures, and to decide a point where the two code-paths 
> will be joined to a single representation of the build 
> configuration. According to the ZOI rule, you might as well 
> take the extra step and support infinity formats!

This might make sense from a technical point of view, but do we 
want it? In the extreme case, we'd end up with a different format 
for each package, though more likely will be a distribution where 
most packages focus on one or two formats, but with a looooong 
tail...

> This mechanism can also be used for splitting the build file - 
> which can be useful if you want to have parts of it updated 
> regularly by automatic tools, or to put only parts of the build 
> configuration under source control. For this, different file 
> names can be put in the "file" field even if they all use the 
> same format, and "parser" can be omitted to read JSON files.

This is useful in any case, no matter how many formats we're 
going to support.