XML Library - Suggestions

Why not use JSON? It's a much cleaner representation than XML for most data (in my opinion).

JSON is a different beast, but here's an idea of how some of it might look:

{   "speakers":
    [
        {   'name': 'Daniel',


            'nodes':
            [  
                {   'if': 'Location('Town') and !HasQuest('DuckQuest')',
                    'then': 'GiveItem('Duck')',
                    'next': 'Daniel's Quest',
                    
                    'lines':
                    [   
                        'Hi there, I'm Daniel! I hate the town. Here - have a duck!'
                    ]
                },


                {   "if": "Location('Forest') and !HasQuest('DuckQuest')",
                    "then": "GiveItem('Duck')",
                    "next": "Daniel's Quest",
                    
                    "lines":
                    [   
                        'Hi there, I'm Daniel! I love this forest. I found this duck - take it!'
                    ]
                },


                {   "if": "!HasQuest('DuckQuest')",
                    "label": "Daniel's quest",
                    "then": "AddQuest('DuckQuest')",
                    "next": "END",


                    "lines":
                    [   
                        'Take the duck to my Auntie Madge. She loves duck. Not to suggest that she'll eat it or anything.',
                        'I mean she might.',
                        'There's a chance of it, yeah.',
                        'Okay yeah, she'll eat it. What can I say, it's nature?'
                    ]
                },


                {   "if": "HasQuest('DuckQuest') == Active",
                    
                    "lines":
                    [
                        'Did you give the duck to Aunt Madge yet?'
                    ],


                    "options":
                    [
                        {   'next': 'DuckQuest-A',
                            'content': 'Yep, I did'
                        },


                        {   'next': 'DuckQuest-B',
                            'content': 'No, I did not'
                        }
                    ]
                }
            ]
        }
    ]
}

As for a parser, Please login to see this link. is the one used in the Edif SDK.

I too think you should use JSON for this - it will have a smaller file size, it will be much easier to type and read, and James has already written a parser that, if you're using EDIF, you already have in your project. If you're not using EDIF, you're missing out

Well JSON is nice. I don't find it particularly more readable than your XML example. Obviously JSON has it's advantages on the web (in the context of JavaScript and file size before compression), but there is a lot of XML-hate going around at the moment which is unwarranted in general, along with a general notion that writing less is always better, and significant whitespace is all the hype, man. I don't advocate either option. Just consider your use case and how quickly existing tools will help you get the job done. For JSON I would suggest trying James' JSON parser, but I don't know if it can encode for saving JSON to a file (i.e. it is just a parser and not an encoder). For XML I would definitely suggest TinyXML, it's so simple and manages its own memory so you don't have to worry too much about leaking, and can load and save xml files very easily without too much hassle. I used it because all I wanted was a file format that could be read in plain text and a well developed library that would abstract most of the hassle of loading and saving a document structures, and TinyXML does this. Someone should suggest a JSON library that is equally agile, but I don't personally know of any.

Quote from MattEsch

Someone should suggest a JSON library that is equally agile, but I don't personally know of any.

I count 21 C/C++ JSON parsers listed on Please login to see this link.. Surely at least one of them must meet your criteria.

Well I meant someone with experience of a suitable implementation should highlight it. I can't do that because I haven't tried out any of the 21 JSON parsers you mention, and just pointing at them (I was aware before hand anyway) doesn't make it any more obvious which ones are worth using. I can easily strike off those that only parse JSON, but I wouldn't be able to say which of these libraries are nice to use when encoding and parsing JSON, and that's essentially what the question is asking for. Hence someone should suggest one that they know from experience matches the quality of a library like TinyXML.

What's EDIF? And how can I use all this JSON stuff?

Would this be useful in my eternal quest to make that point and click dialogue tree that I keep asking about work in MMF2?

Check my Signature where it says "Write Extensions with EDIF!", there are two different hyperlinks. The first is the main post, the second explains it.