1Introduction

The parser.ini system provides a parser for the "ini-like" family of configuration syntaxes. A builder-based protocol is used to construct parse results.

2Tutorial

To parse a string of configuration options and return the result as a simple list-based structure, the parse function is called with the symbol list instead of a more complicated builder object:

    (parser.ini:parse "[section] option = value" 'list)

  ((:SECTION
    (:SECTION-OPTION
     (((:OPTION NIL :NAME ("option") :VALUE "value" :BOUNDS (10 . 24)))))
    :NAME ("section") :BOUNDS (0 . 9)))

Syntactic variants (comments, assignment operator, interpretation of whitespace in values, etc.) are controlled via special variables (note : instead of =):

    (let ((parser.ini:*assignment-operator* #\:))
      (parser.ini:parse "[section] option: value" 'list))

  ((:SECTION
    (:SECTION-OPTION
     (((:OPTION NIL :NAME ("option") :VALUE "value" :BOUNDS (10 . 23)))))
    :NAME ("section") :BOUNDS (0 . 9)))

The builder-based protocol allows constructing arbitrary result objects:

    (defstruct located bounds)
    (defstruct (section (:include located)) name options)
    (defstruct (option (:include located)) name value)

    (defmethod architecture.builder-protocol:make-node
        ((builder (eql :my-builder)) (kind (eql :section)) &key name bounds)
      (make-section :name name :bounds bounds))

    (defmethod architecture.builder-protocol:relate
        ((builder  (eql :my-builder))
         (relation (eql :section-option))
         (left     section)
         (right    option)
         &key)
      (alexandria:appendf (section-options left) (list right))
      left)

    (defmethod architecture.builder-protocol:make-node
        ((builder (eql :my-builder)) (kind (eql :option)) &key name value bounds)
      (make-option :name name :value value :bounds bounds))

    (parser.ini:parse "[section] option = value" :my-builder)

(#S(SECTION
    :BOUNDS (0 . 9)
    :NAME ("section")
    :OPTIONS (#S(OPTION :BOUNDS (10 . 24) :NAME ("option") :VALUE "value"))))
NIL
T

3TODOReference

4Settings :noexport: