In Java configuration properties can only be key-value pairs e.g.
db_user="admin"
db_password="letmein"
Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to group configuration properties? This is exactly what you can do in Groovy using the ConfigSlurper class. It allows you to write config files like the following:
db {
user="admin"
password="letmein"
}
commands{
setup="GET_DATABASE,GET_JBOSS_SERVER_FILES,CHECK_JBOSS_SERVER_FILES"
refresh="GET_DATABASE"
check="CHECK_JBOSS_SERVER_FILES,CHECK_APACHE_WORKER_PROPERTIES"
}
These properties are read in as a map of maps, and you can access each property by using the dot operator on the configuration object:
config = new ConfigSlurper().parse(new File("myApp.config").toURL())
dbUser = config.db.user
dbPassword = config.db.root
For more info, see:
http://groovy.codehaus.org/ConfigSlurper 