There exists a peculiar amnesia in software engineering regarding XML. Mention it in most circles and you will receive knowing smiles, dismissive waves, the sort of patronizing acknowledgment reserved for technologies deemed passé. “Oh, XML,” they say, as if the very syllables carry the weight of obsolescence. “We use JSON now. Much cleaner.”
Exactly. I’ve seen so much data destroyed silently deep in some bioinformatics pipeline due to this that I’ve just become an anti CSV advocate.
Use literally anything else that doesn’t need out of band “I’m using this dialect” information that has to match to prevent data loss.