Editing YAML (section)

===Example===

Data-structure hierarchy is maintained by outline indentation.

<syntaxhighlight lang="yaml">
---
receipt:     Oz-Ware Purchase Invoice
date:        2012-08-06
customer:
    first_name:   Dorothy
    family_name:  Gale

items:
    - part_no:   A4786
      descrip:   Water Bucket (Filled)
      price:     1.47
      quantity:  4

    - part_no:   E1628
      descrip:   High Heeled "Ruby" Slippers
      size:      8
      price:     133.7
      quantity:  1

bill-to:  &id001
    street: |
            123 Tornado Alley
            Suite 16
    city:   East Centerville
    state:  KS

ship-to:  *id001

specialDelivery:  >
    Follow the Yellow Brick
    Road to the Emerald City.
    Pay no attention to the
    man behind the curtain.
...
</syntaxhighlight>

Notice that strings do not require enclosure in quotation marks. The specific number of spaces in the indentation is unimportant as long as parallel elements have the same left justification and the hierarchically nested elements are indented further. This sample document defines an associative array with 7 top level keys: one of the keys, "items", contains a 2-element list, each element of which is itself an associative array with differing keys. Relational data and redundancy removal are displayed: the "ship-to" associative array content is copied from the "bill-to" associative array's content as indicated by the anchor ({{code|&}}) and reference ({{code|*}}) labels. Optional blank lines can be added for readability. Multiple documents can exist in a single file/stream and are separated by {{code|---}}. An optional {{code|...}} can be used at the end of a file (useful for signaling an end in streamed communications without closing the pipe).