TSON – A JSON superset with immutable, hash-pinned schemas • Hacker News Board

pratyahava wrote: post #24

lokar wrote: post #20

Seem to different from JSON to be an easy drop in, while still having the problems of json. I’d rather use something further away like cue.

cue? what is that? i remember only cue which holds audio tracks metadata.

https://cuelang.org/docs/reference/spec/

I’ve used it once for something small. It was ok, but the docs and some of the libraries were a bit lacking.

But it demonstrates the kind of things you could have if you don’t care about text/parser compatibility with json

Re: TSON – A JSON superset with immutable, hash-pinned schemas

#35

Post by kelseydh » Wed, Aug 05, 2026, 5:05 PM UTC

minraws wrote: post #13

you can just add schema to json why add new syntax now, especially for json I dont think it makes sense I honestly believe the war is over there won't be a xml to json moment unless we move to a new platform other than browsers which seem rather unlikely, json honestly is fine for something that's somewhat human readable...

A change in the direction of protobufs to reduce serialization and transfer costs of data exchange seems most likely the next trend.

Re: TSON – A JSON superset with immutable, hash-pinned schemas

#36

Post by corbindavenport » Wed, Aug 05, 2026, 5:09 PM UTC

The website smells vibe-coded.

Re: TSON – A JSON superset with immutable, hash-pinned schemas

#37

Post by aggregator-ios » Wed, Aug 05, 2026, 5:11 PM UTC

corbindavenport wrote: post #36

The website smells vibe-coded.

My thoughts exactly. I don't mind AI coding, but I'm not really sure on the viability of anyone using or even hearing of TSON. This is just not something you do without an RFC and adoption.

Re: TSON – A JSON superset with immutable, hash-pinned schemas

#38

Post by conartist6 » Wed, Aug 05, 2026, 5:19 PM UTC

yourapostasy wrote: post #29

hmokiguess wrote: post #12

I think I'm gonna go back to XSLT

I sometimes wonder if we as an industry should revisit XML for those use cases where painful JSON contortions are being used, now that LLM's can plausibly support writing the syntax for XML-adjacent languages like XSLT without as steep a learning and sustainment curve. My natural inclination is to design to accommodate as complex a space as the business requirements project for, because representation data structures…

I think the industry has an XML-shaped hole for sure, but XML itself was still designed before about 30 years of hard-won knowledge about smart design of data languages.

If you want to know how I would approach designinga language to fill XML's market niche, check out https://docs.bablr.org/guides/cstml

Re: TSON – A JSON superset with immutable, hash-pinned schemas

#39

Post by tanepiper » Wed, Aug 05, 2026, 5:21 PM UTC

Getting flashback to coffeescript

Re: TSON – A JSON superset with immutable, hash-pinned schemas

#40

Post by thyristan » Wed, Aug 05, 2026, 5:22 PM UTC

Dislike.

No comments means that one cannot use it for configuration. Properties repeat the XML mistake of the attribute/content dichotomy.

And trailing commas as a syntax error prevents easy sorting/appending/editing of arrays.

And it doesn't fix a ton of JSON problems like strings containing newlines, quotes and the like, while introducing a ton of new problems, like the dependency on obscure Unicode features to elide quotes. This will lead to TSON homoglyph attacks.