Best way to understand YAML

[Axal]

Hello everyone,

Anyone know how is the best way to understand or read YAML for the DevOps pipeline ? I'm really newbie in this kind of area, and finding it is difficult to read (not to mentioned to edit) YAML. Should we translate it to the basic visual steps first ? Is there a convert tools for that ?

Reason is I was given YAML Script (by someone who already left the company) and this is a 950 lines of script. I tried to understand it row by row but it is quite hard, so wondering whether there is a best approach that I do not know.

Thanks

[cchannon]

Sorry, there's no shortcut to this that I've ever seen. Best advice I can give you is to put the YAML into an editor like Notepad++ where you can collapse sections so you can start to read the outline of the pipeline and not get distracted by the details in each operation.

[Axal]

Hi @cchannon 

In every YAML script that we have, even after read it like your advice by using Notepad++, is it possible that each of those has the reference of the basic DevOps steps ?

I mean after read one single YAML, based on that information, then we do it again with the basic DevOps steps. Or is inside the YAML script there are some which not supported or available in DevOps basic step ? or in some part, lets say variable assignment, we must not follow what it is scripted in those YAML code, instead we must do it differently in DevOps basic step ? this also can means in the basic DevOps steps, there will be more parameters need to fill instead.

I'm getting the feeling, with this differences between using YAML or using basic steps, I should learn two language or two things at once which is distracting my learning process.

Thanks for your advices.

[cchannon · Accepted solution]

Yes, the designer interface and the YAML management are very different experiences. The designer is rendering YAML in the background though, so if you want to see how the designer relates to YAML, you can always build a pipeline with the designer and then export the YAML to look at it.

I should also point out that devops pipeline operations are often being updated. If you are seeing parameter differences between the YAML someone else handed you and the options in the designer interface, maybe it is just that the YAML is old and was based on an older definition of the connector.