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Date:	Tue, 10 Feb 2015 00:21:29 +0100 (CET)
From:	Roland Lutz <rlutz AT hedmen DOT org>
To:	geda-user AT delorie DOT com
Subject:	Re: [geda-user] Using Lua to safely read configuration and layout
	files (program attached)
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You don't gain anything by formatting the data differently.

No matter if the file format looks like XML, Lua, or plain numbers, you 
have to parse it to do anything useful with it, and you have to put it 
into a context to do most interesting things.  Whether you do the former 
using a XML/Lua library or a mostly trivial parser doesn't make much of a 
difference.

The one benefit from the current format is that it can easily be processed 
by almost any tool; the drawback being that editing it by hand requires a 
reference in another window.  The only thing which can be achieved by 
changing the data formatting other than optimizing for different user 
preferences is reducing the need for this reference, probably at the cost 
of degrading parseability.

You are suggesting your files could be converted to gEDA format using a 
simple script.  If that is so, why can't gEDA files be converted to your 
format for Lua processing using a complementary script?

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