[mhsred5]

The problem with using a general programming language for configuration is you end up needing to use that config in different places, in different contexts, and from different languages. So, you have to marshall out and marshall in that structure to some intermediate format.

You want it to be easy for humans to edit and grok, so you find a way to represent the core parts you care about as text and cordone off the general programming language to another area.

You're successful and the number of use cases you cover grows, so the size of that config grows.

And before you know it, you've invented YAML.

Whereas, if you use Cue instead of YAML it looks pretty similar - in fact some large subset of it will be parsed correctly by a YAML parser. But the difference is with Cue you can: 1. Validate the structures in your config 2. Deduplicate by referencing other values in your config (something you can't do in JSON/YAML). 3. Use language built-ins to reduce boiler plate and repetitive text.