N.O.N. v2.1 - Wishart Core

1) Scope

• Indentation-driven object/list notation.
• Engine-oriented literals: vectors, colors, references.
• Meta keys via @ prefix for root descriptors.
• Two parser modes: strict and lenient.

2) Lexical & Structural Rules

• Canonical indent unit: 4 spaces.
• Tabs are rejected in strict mode.
• Keys use key: value; nested blocks use a trailing colon with no inline value.
• Lists use dash items (- value) or inline arrays ([a, b]).
• Comment lines start with # as the first non-space character.

@entity: npc_guard_01
@class: Guard
    name: "Royal Guard"
    level: 15
    stats:
        hp: 200
        dex: 12

3) Scalar Parsing Order

• Booleans: true / false (case-insensitive).
• Null: null or ~.
• Integers/floats with optional sign.
• Color literal: #RRGGBB.
• Vector2/Vector3: (x, y) / (x, y, z).
• Reference token: &id.
• Quoted strings support \" escaping.
• Everything else resolves to plain string.

4) Canonical JSON Bridge

Suggested bridge targets for consumers that do not parse N.O.N. directly:

• Reference values map to { "$ref": "id" }.
• Vectors map to { "x": n, "y": n, "z": n? }.
• Meta keys map into _meta.
• Color literal remains string by default.

{
  "_meta": { "entity": "npc_guard_01", "class": "Guard" },
  "name": "Royal Guard",
  "position": { "x": 120, "y": 0, "z": 45 },
  "target": { "$ref": "enemy_01" }
}

5) Strict vs Lenient Mode

• Strict: tabs, mixed indent, malformed lines, and ambiguous blocks are fatal errors.
• Lenient: attempts parse recovery and emits warnings where possible.
• Both should report line and column for failures.

6) Test Matrix (Minimum Suite)

• Indent and dedent correctness, mixed whitespace rejection.
• Quoted/unquoted strings with colon, hash, and spaces.
• Numeric, boolean, null, color, vector and reference literals.
• Nested list/object combinations and inline arrays.
• Round-trip behavior for N.O.N. -> JSON -> N.O.N.

Case 01: Basic key/value object
Case 02: Nested object with 4-space indent
Case 03: Dash list of scalars
Case 04: Dash list of objects
Case 05: Inline list parser
Case 06: Vector parsing
Case 07: Color literal parsing
Case 08: Reference token serialization
Case 09: Invalid mixed tab + spaces (strict fail)
Case 10: Invalid malformed key line (strict fail)

7) Parser API (non.js)

• parseNon(text, options): parse to canonical JSON shape.
• stringifyNon(value, options): format JSON as N.O.N.
• nonToJson(text, options): alias of parseNon.
• jsonToNon(value, options): alias of stringifyNon.

Download Draft

The full markdown draft is available in the project root.