Harshit Sharma
What is YAML

Photo by Patrick Perkins on Unsplash

What is YAML

Harshit Sharma's photo
Harshit Sharma
·

2 min read

Table of contents

YAML stands for Yet Another Markup Language or YAML ain't Markup Language, and it is a data serialization language used to write configuration files. But what is data serialization??

Data Serialization: A process of converting a data object into a series of bytes in a form that is easily transmittable over a network.

In easy terms, data serialization means converting data into a form that can be transmitted easily. We use languages like YAML, JSON, XML for data serialization.

YAML, as I told you above, is also used to write config files for Docker, Kubernetes, Flutter, etc.

Benefits of YAML

  • It is simple and easy to read.

  • It has Python style indentation format (but we use spaces here, instead of tabs)

  • YAML is easily convertible to JSON, or XML.

  • Plenty of tools are available!

Check out these tools for working with YAML files: https://onlineyamltools.com/

Extension of YAML Files

YAML uses these file extensions: *.yaml and *.yml

How to write comments in YAML

YAML uses Python like comments as well. You have to write a hashtag # to start a comment.

How to write YAML Files

Key Value Pairs

You can write key-value pairs as follows:

"Harshit": "I am learning DevOps"     # A simple key-value pair

bio: |                                # Multi line string
Hey, my name is Harshit Sharma
I am a pre-final year student

message: >                            # A single line in multiple lines
This is a
single line

List

You can write a list as follows:

fruits:
 - Apple
 - Mango
 - mango             # YAML is case sensitive, so this mango is different

# This can also be represented as

fruits: [Apple, Mango, mango]

Different Types

# Integers
positiveNumber: !!int 12
negativeNumber: !!int -12
binaryNumber: !!int 0b010101
octalNumber: !!int 05673
hexaNumber: !!int 0x45A
commaValue: !!int +120_000                # Will be represented as 120,000

# Floats
marks: !!float 95.8                       # My board exam marks ;)
not_a_number: !!float .nan
infinite: !!float .inf

# Null
surname: !!null Null                       # or null NULL ~

# Dates
date: !!timestamp 2002-12-14
indiaTime: !!timestamo 2001-11-04T17:30:00 +5:30

# List
student: !!seq
 - name
 - marks
 - hobbies

That's all for this article!

Hope you liked it!

Connect with me:

🔗 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/harshit-sharma--/

🔗 My YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/CoderBuddy?sub_confirmation=1

🔗 GitHub: https://github.com/harshit-sharma-gits

YAMLDevopsDevOps JourneyFlutter