TOML

Tom's Obvious, Minimal Language (TOML, originally Tom's Own Markup Language ) is a file format for configuration files. It is intended to be easy to read and write due to obvious semantics which aim to be "minimal", and it is designed to map unambiguously to a dictionary. Originally created by Tom Preston-Werner, its specification is open source. TOML is used in a number of software projects and is implemented in many programming languages.

Syntax
TOML's syntax primarily consists of  pairs, , and   (for comments). TOML's syntax somewhat resembles that of .INI files, but it includes a formal specification, whereas the INI file format suffers from many competing variants.

Its specification includes a list of supported data types: string, integer, float, boolean, datetime, array, and table.

Use cases
TOML is used in a variety of settings (some related to its creator), such as:
 * Static site generators like Jekyll and Hugo.
 * Python programming language
 * Rust package manifest
 * Julia project setting and package manifest

Criticism
TOML has been criticized on a number of points:


 * TOML is verbose; it is not DRY and is syntactically noisy.
 * TOML's hierarchies can be difficult to infer from syntax alone.
 * Overcomplication: Like YAML, TOML has too many features.
 * In TOML, the syntax determines the data types ("syntax typing").