MAML
Shares rank 8 of 9 configuration languages by recommenders
JSON-style config language with comments, multiline strings and optional commas, plus a spec. Critics say it's too small an improvement over JSON.
JSON-style config language with comments, multiline strings and optional commas, plus a spec. Critics say it's too small an improvement over JSON.
9 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 5
- criticize it
- 4
- approval share
- 56%
Recommended in 3 of 13 months
- November 2025: recommended
- December 2025: not recommended
- January 2026: not recommended
- February 2026: not recommended
- March 2026: not recommended
- April 2026: recommended
- May 2026: recommended
- June 2026: not recommended
- July 2026: not recommended
- August 2026: not recommended
- September 2026: not recommended
- October 2026: not recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it doesn’t carry the badge
- 5 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, not met.
- 1.2 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, not met.
- Recommended in 3 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, not met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Human-friendly take on JSON
“I personally think the best is one of the humanized json ones like https://maml.dev/”
Comment from 23 May 2026 in “YAML? That's Norway Problem” “everything that's good about JSON, plus everything fixed for human writing”
Comment from 17 Nov 2025 in “Things I don't like in configuration languages”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Just JSON with extra features
“It's yet another JSON with comments, multiline strings, and optional commas. It's the most boring part of the page.”
Comment from 17 Nov 2025 in “Things I don't like in configuration languages” “It is yet another JSON with comments, multiline strings, and optional commas.”
Comment from 17 Nov 2025 in “Things I don't like in configuration languages”
Other configuration languages people recommend
The four most recommended other configuration languages, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
See all 9 configuration languages, rankedWhat people said
9 of the 10 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“I personally think the best is one of the humanized json ones like https://maml.dev/”
“now with specification and 100% coverage, reference implementation it’s just one prompt to reimplement parser in another language”
“It's not a sufficient improvement over JSON for it to be worthwhile.”
“And now it's incompatible with JSON, which is the worst part of the idea.”
“Personally I think it's a very good decision.”
“does not improve the data types much”
“It is yet another JSON with comments, multiline strings, and optional commas.”
“everything that's good about JSON, plus everything fixed for human writing”
“It's yet another JSON with comments, multiline strings, and optional commas. It's the most boring part of the page.”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.