Tree-Backed Regular Table

Archmage recognizes a tree-structured data file as a tree-backed regular table whenever its structure satisfies the following criteria:

• The root is a tree map (automatically inferred, or explicitly declared).
• Each map key is an integer (even if represented as a string) or a string.
• Each map value is a tree object.

hero.yaml

# Tree-Backed Regular Table
1:
  name: Arthur
  power: 100
2:
  name: Merlin
  power: 80

hero.json

{
  "1": {
    "name": "Arthur",
    "power": 100
  },
  "2": {
    "name": "Merlin",
    "power": 80
  }
}

Like standard regular tables, a tree-backed regular table:

• Can be the target of a ref, or the source of a backref/backref-n.
• Can have anchor, origin, backref, and backref-n fields.
• Can serve as a partition of a virtual table.

Note

In most cases, the term “regular table” throughout the Archmage documentation refers to both standard and tree-backed regular tables.

The Config ID

In a tree-backed regular table, each key in the root map serves as a config ID, and its corresponding value serves as a config entry.

When root map keys are integers, they must be > 0.

Declaring an Anchor

hero.yaml

1:
  name: Arthur Pendragon
  anchor: arthur
  anchor__meta__:
    type: anchor
2:
  name: Merlin Ambrosius
  anchor: merlin

hero.json

{
  "1": {
    "name": "Arthur Pendragon",
    "anchor": "arthur",
    "anchor__meta__": {
      "type": "anchor"
    }
  },
  "2": {
    "name": "Merlin Ambrosius",
    "anchor": "merlin"
  }
}

Declaring a Passive Field

Passive types require no manual input. Their data nodes must be either omitted or set to null.

hero.yaml

1:
  name: Arthur
  signatureWeapon__meta__:
    type: backref@item
  skills: null  # can be omitted
  skills__meta__:
    type: backref-n@skill
  origin__meta__:
    type: origin
2:
  name: Merlin

hero.json

{
  "1": {
    "name": "Arthur",
    "signatureWeapon__meta__": {
      "type": "backref@item"
    },
    "skills": null,
    "skills__meta__": {
      "type": "backref-n@skill"
    },
    "origin__meta__": {
      "type": "origin"
    }
  },
  "2": {
    "name": "Merlin"
  }
}

See Also

• Config ID
• Meta Nodes
• Referent Syntax