[mitchellgoffpc]

The lisp folks are probably wondering why it took us so long to figure out the whole “all configuration is code” thing haha

[zvr]

The Tcl folks are also wondering the same thing...

A "configuration file" is simply a valid script that is executed in a safe interpreter.

[emodendroket]

I know there was a vogue to pretend otherwise but there are definitely benefits to not letting your config file execute arbitrary code.

[thewakalix]

What do you mean by “arbitrary”? If you don’t want it to access the network or whatever, that’s definitely possible. If you don’t want it to be able to loop forever, though, Turing-incomplete languages like Dhall exist, but that doesn’t stop them from expressing “loop for a trillion years” — but you can always say “we’ll execute this config file for a second and then halt with an error if it isn’t already done”. (You can also pipe an infinite stream into a FIFO and trick your program even if it uses a dumb config language.)