development.yml fails when there are YAML evals + long lines + prettier + format_on_save

[joelparkerhenderson]

Loco uses the file config/development.yml and similar ones, but these are failing due to glitches with some editors and formatters, notably zed, prettier, and the zed "format_on_save" setting.

Example file line:

uri: {{ get_env(name="DB_URL", default="postgres://username:password@hostname:5432/database") }}

To reproduce the failure, open the file in the zed editor with zed default settings such as a fresh install. Make any edit, then save. This causes zed + prettier to do an automatic reformat that forces multi-line and inserts commas, like this:

uri:
  {
    { 
      get_env(name="DB_URL", default="postgres://username:password@hostname:5432/database") 
    },
  }

This glitch causes Loco to fail on start.

I've reported the problem here: zed-industries/zed#46632

The root cause seems to be that the Loco configuration file format is sort-of-YAML but sort-of-not YAML. I'm generally aware of these kinds of YAML glitches in other tools, such as with Ansible and also templating syntaxes.

My workaround is to add a zed settings file that disables the global "*_on_save" settings, and later I'll add specific syntax adjustments for specific languages and file names:

{
  "format_on_save": false,
  "remove_trailing_whitespace_on_save": false,
  "ensure_final_newline_on_save": false
}

Could Loco eventually upgrade to using Rust instead of YAML for the configuration files? IMHO upgrading from YAML to Rust would be safer, and also easier to edit, and also more like Rails which uses Ruby for its config files.

Thanks for your consideration, and for Loco.

[afarinetti]

It seems to be the {{ getting reformatted to { { that is doing the above for me.

I had to disable the yaml-language-server formatting in Zed to get it to stop doing it, for me. Obviously, this is non-ideal.

My project .zed/settings.json file:

{
    "languages": {
        "YAML": {
            "formatter": "language_server"
        }
    },
    "lsp": {
        "yaml-language-server": {
            "settings": {
                "yaml": {
                    "format": {
                        "enable": false
                    }
                }
            }
        }
    }
}

[arferreira]

I suffered a lot @joelparkerhenderson with this problem on my nvim, but as @afarinetti mentioned above, that LSP setting will help you to fix that easily.

[joelparkerhenderson]

that LSP setting will help you to fix that easily.

Thanks. What I'm hoping to achieve is the next steps for helping more people too.

Here's what I mean:

When I use Rails, I use the same language of the app for config.

When I use Loco, I spend hours figuring out the YAML long line issue, then how to create an editor setting file, then disabling an LSP, the fine-tuning the exclusions to solely opt-out of reformatting the Loco files.

What I'm reading is the code that Loco generates isn't valid YAML for the LSP because the text uses the double-curlies, similar to Ansbile templating syntax. The outcume is I now have to research what YAML is, exactly, and whether the Loco files are exactly YAML or are something else such as a templating language like jinja2, why Rust chose TOML over YAML, the Norway "NO" YAML problem, and why Loco's use of YAML formatting conflicts with the YAML LSP authors who are explaining that Loco YAML isn't valid YAML.

Rightly or wrongly, it's too far down in the weeds for me recommending Loco-- especially when there's a better smarter faster solution possible, namely switching Loco from using YAML config to using Rust config.

There are many advantages to this IMHO, such as better safety checks, smoother path to developers adding confy and/or clap and/or env vars, and especially the power to create a release with a single binary file-- no need for separate config files, no need for binary-and-text proofing for reproducible builds, and no need for separate copying these files to the deployment server, etc.

I'm all in on the Rails-to-Rust upgrade path. This includes using Rust everywhere I can. <3