[_0w8t]

JSON is not language that "makes it very easy to write tools to generate new configs or manipulate existing ones". One cannot realistically consume JSON in a shell script, and even with tools that have native JSON support manipulating the config require the knowledge of document semantics as the language itself does not define how to combine or merge 2 documents into one.

For example, consider an application that comes with a complex JSON (or YAML as that language also share this shortcomings) that essentially describes default settings. I cannot just define an extra file that specifies a couple settings that I alter/delete/add, I have to have my own copy of the original file with my changes resulting in painful merge when the original is updated.

What I have found is that things like .ini files or config files in style of ssh_config work much better in practice. It is easy to generate and process them in any language with a notion of text IO including shell scripts and the merging functionality can be provided independent of semantics so I can keep config fragment outside the main file/files.