What be this HOCON
HOCON (Horribly Over-Complicated Object Notation) be the weird way to configure stuff in Sponge and plugins. They be storing valuable treasure with it, like player data or configuration. Them bizarre HOCON files be tattooed with .conf
, but at least they be easier than writing on that snake YAML.
Bits and Pieces
a
key
is a string preceding a valuea
value
is a string, number, object, array, or boolean following akey
a
key-value separator
separates keys from values, and can be either:
or=
a
comment
is prefixed with#
or//
, typically serving to provide feedback or instructions
Example:
yellow-thing: "Sponge"
In this example, the key
is yellow-thing
, the value
is Sponge
, and the key-value separator
is :
.
Working with HOCON
HOCON is more flexible than the JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) format in that there are several ways to write valid HOCON. Below are two examples of valid HOCON.
Example #1:
player: {
name: "Steve",
level: 30
}
Example #2:
player {
name = "Steve"
level = 30
}
In practice, it is best to follow the formatting conventions of the HOCON configuration you are editing. When editing a HOCON configuration for Sponge or an individual plugin utilizing the Sponge API, the values are likely the only thing you will be changing unless otherwise specified.
Debugging your configuration
If a HOCON configuration does not appear to be working, here are some tips.
Curly braces must be balanced
Quotation marks must be balanced
Duplicate keys that appear later take precedence
Specification
More information about the HOCON format can be found here.