Pardon my ignorance about formats, but between XML & JSON, what would have made them choose XML? As I understand there is lot more tooling, standards & existing software examples around JSON for project & records management (e.g. VSCode's records as settings.json for example). Wasn't XML spearheaded by Microsoft but mostly used by Microsoft today?
json's only advantage is it's easier to write by hand, but that's not really a consideration here. XML has schema support and much more tooling available.
But even before it became officially unmaintained, it was already quite unloved, and it's one of the most used xml library.
We are not in the peak Java/J2EE era anymore. Pretty much nobody is going to willingly work on the foundations unless they're getting paid because the majority absolutely loathes XML and would not see maintaining XML libs as fun, and guess what, they're not? xslt also got removed from web browsers because nobody wants to maintain those libraries. And corporations like Google don't want to pay a dev for those either.
Meanwhile the tooling around JSON is as healthy as it's ever been, with very efficient implementations in most common programming languages and multiple SIMD impls in C, C++, Rust etc. People actually want to work on this.
> As I understand there is lot more tooling, standards & existing software examples around JSON for project & records management
I don't understand why that is relevant; as long as there is a minimum level of tooling, libraries and support for their choice, what benefit would JSON bring over XML? I don't see a clear reason for one over the other.
Honestly, I'd have the same question if they chose JSON and someone asked why did they choose JSON over XML - Why wouldn't they?
> previous editions... used a sliver of the resources
Well of course, but given that the previously employed technique was blitting, fliedumping memory areas, you can't be more efficient than that. Using XML is for transparency (readability).
(And, note, in context, I regard the ms office file format as lousy. The OpenOffice/LibreOffice format is good.)
I don't think your parent comment was talking about the resources involved in saving a file, but rather the resources involved in running the software.
Thank you, probably so, but in that case I cannot see how said comment is consistent in the branch ("about file formats") - I do not get how it would follow.
