How do I break a string in YAML over multiple lines

Question

In YAML  I have a string that s very long  I want to keep this within the 80-column  or so  view of my editor  so I d like to break the string  What s the syntax for this   In other words  I have this   Key   this is my very very very very very very long string    and I d like to have this  or something to this effect    Key   this is my very very very           long string    I d like to use quotes as above  so I don t need to escape anything within the string

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In case you re using YAML and Twig for translations in Symfony  and want to use multi-line translations in Javascript  a carriage return is added right after the translation  So even the following code   var javascriptVariable      -  key  trans -      Which has the following yml translation   key   gt      This is a     multi line      translation    Will still result into the following code in html   var javascriptVariable    This is a multi line translation       So  the minus sign in Twig does not solve this  The solution is to add this minus sign after the greater than sign in yml   key   gt -     This is a     multi line      translation    Will have the proper result  multi line translation on one line in Twig   var javascriptVariable    This is a multi line translation

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There are 5 6 NINE  or 63   depending how you count  different ways to write multi-line strings in YAML   TL DR   Use  gt  most of the time  interior line breaks are stripped out  although you get one at the end   key   gt    Your long   string here   Use   if you want those linebreaks to be preserved as  n  for instance  embedded markdown with paragraphs    key          Heading      Bullet     Points  Use  gt - or  - instead if you don t want a linebreak appended at the end  Use       if you need to split lines in the middle of words or want to literally type linebreaks as  n   key   Antidisestab   lishmentarianism  n nGet on it    YAML is crazy    Block scalar styles   gt       These allow characters such as   and   without escaping  and add a new line   n  to the end of your string    gt  Folded style removes single newlines within the string  but adds one at the end  and converts double newlines to singles    Key   gt    this is my very very very   long string     this is my very very very long string n    Literal style turns every newline within the string into a literal newline  and adds one at the end   Key      this is my very very very    long string     this is my very very very nlong string n  Here s the official definition from the YAML Spec 1 2     Scalar content can be written in block notation  using a literal style  indicated by          where all line breaks are significant  Alternatively  they can be written with the folded style  denoted by          where each line break is folded to a space unless it ends an empty or a more-indented line    Block styles with block chomping indicator   gt -   -   gt         You can control the handling of the final new line in the string  and any trailing blank lines   n n  by adding a block chomping indicator character     gt       clip   keep the line feed  remove the trailing blank lines   gt -   -   strip   remove the line feed  remove the trailing blank lines   gt         keep   keep the line feed  keep trailing blank lines     Flow  scalar styles           These have limited escaping  and construct a single-line string with no new line characters  They can begin on the same line as the key  or with additional newlines first   plain style  no escaping  no   or   combinations  limits on first character    Key  this is my very very very    long string   double-quoted style    and   must be escaped by    newlines can be inserted with a literal  n sequence  lines can be concatenated without spaces with trailing      Key   this is my very very   very   loooo    ng string  n nLove  YAML      rarr   this is my very very   very   loooong string  n nLove  YAML    single-quoted style  literal   must be doubled  no special characters  possibly useful for expressing strings starting with double quotes    Key   this is my very very  very    long string  isn  t it      rarr   this is my very very   very   long string  isn t it    Summary  In this table    means space character   n means  newline character    n in JavaScript   except for the  in-line newlines  row  where it means literally a backslash and an n                           gt                                gt -      gt        -        ------------------------- ------ ----- ----- ----- ------ ------ ------ ------   Trailing spaces     Kept   Kept                     Kept   Kept   Kept   Kept Single newline   gt            n                                      n      n Double newline   gt     n      n n    n     n     n     n       n     n n    n n Final newline    gt     n      n                                n            n Final dbl nl s   gt                                           Kept          Kept   In-line newlines    No     No     No     n    No    No     No     No     No Spaceless newlines  No     No     No          No    No     No     No     No  Single quote                                                               Double quote                                                               Backslash                                                                                      Ok     Ok     No    Ok    Ok    Ok     Ok     Ok     Ok Can start on same   No     No     Yes   Yes   Yes   No     No     No     No line as key           Examples  Note the trailing spaces on the line before  spaces    -  gt    very  long     string  with    paragraph gap   n and           spaces  -      very  long     string  with    paragraph gap   n and           spaces  - very  long     string  with    paragraph gap   n and           spaces  -  very   long      string  with    paragraph gap   n and           s    p    a    c    e    s   -  very  long      string   with    paragraph gap   n and           spaces   -  gt -    very  long     string  with    paragraph gap   n and           spaces        very   long    string  with nparagraph gap    n and         spaces  n       very   long   n string  with n nparagraph gap    n and         nspaces  n       very   long    string  with nparagraph gap    n and spaces        very   long    string  with nparagraph gap   n and spaces        very   long    string  with nparagraph gap    n and spaces        very   long    string  with nparagraph gap    n and         spaces       Block styles with indentation indicators  Just in case the above isn t enough for you  you can add a  block indentation indicator   after your block chomping indicator  if you have one    -  gt 8         My long string         starts over here -   1  This one  starts here   Addendum  If you insert extra spaces at the start of not-the-first lines in Folded style  they will be kept  with a bonus newline  This doesn t happen with flow styles   -  gt      my long       string - my long     string       my long n  string n    my long string    I can t even    2 block styles  each with 2 possible block chomping indicators  or none   and with 9 possible indentation indicators  or none   1 plain style and 2 quoted styles  2 x  2   1  x  9   1    1   2   63  Some of this information has also been summarised here

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To concatenate long lines without whitespace  use double quotes and escape the newlines with backslashes   key   Loremipsumdolorsitamet consecteturadipiscingelit seddoeiusmodtemp    orincididuntutlaboreetdoloremagnaaliqua      Thanks  Tobia

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For situations were the string might contain spaces or not  I prefer double quotes and line continuation with backslashes   key   String     with long c    ontent    But note about the pitfall for the case that a continuation line begins with a space  it needs to be escaped  because it will be stripped away elsewhere    key   String      with lon    g content    If the string contains line breaks  this needs to be written in C style  n   See also this question

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To preserve newlines use    for example       This is a very long sentence   that spans several lines in the YAML   but which will be rendered as a string   with newlines preserved    is translated to  This is a very long sentence  n that spans several lines in the YAML  n but which will be rendered as a string  n with newlines preserved  n

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1  Block Notation plain  flow-style  scalar    Newlines become spaces and extra newlines after the block are removed  ---   Note  It has 1 new line after the string content      Arbitrary free text     over multiple lines stopping     after indentation changes           Equivalent JSON      content    Arbitrary free text over multiple lines stopping after indentation changes         2  Literal Block Scalar   A Literal Block Scalar   will include the newlines and any trailing spaces  but removes extra  newlines after the block   ---   After string we have 2 spaces and 2 new lines content1     Arbitrary free text  over  multiple lines  stopping  after indentation changes              Equivalent JSON      content1    Arbitrary free text nover   multiple lines   stopping nafter indentation changes      n      3    indicator with Literal Block Scalar  keep extra newlines after block  ---   After string we have 2 new lines plain      This unquoted scalar  spans many lines          Equivalent JSON      plain    This unquoted scalar nspans many lines  n n n      4      indicator with Literal Block Scalar      means that the newline at the end of the string is removed   ---   After string we have 2 new lines plain   -  This unquoted scalar  spans many lines          Equivalent JSON      plain    This unquoted scalar nspans many lines       5  Folded Block Scalar      will fold newlines to spaces and but removes extra newlines after the block   --- folded newlines   gt   this is really a  single line of text  despite appearances         Equivalent JSON      fold newlines    this is really a single line of text despite appearances n      for more you can visit my Blog

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None of the above solutions worked for me  in a YAML file within a Jekyll project  After trying many options  I realized that an HTML injection with  lt br gt  might do as well  since in the end everything is rendered to HTML   name          In a village of La Mancha  lt br gt  whose name I don t  lt br gt  want to remember   At least it works for me  No idea on the problems associated to this approach

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Using yaml folded style  The indention in each line will be ignored  A line break will be inserted at the end  Key   gt    This is a very long sentence   that spans several lines in the YAML   but which will be rendered as a string   with only a single carriage return appended to the end   http   symfony com doc current components yaml yaml format html You can use the  quot block chomping indicator quot  to eliminate the trailing line break  as follows  Key   gt -   This is a very long sentence   that spans several lines in the YAML   but which will be rendered as a string   with NO carriage returns   In either case  each line break is replaced by a space  There are other control tools available as well  for controlling indentation for example   See https   yaml-multiline info

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You might not believe it  but YAML can do multi-line keys too       gt   multi  line  key     value

[string] How do I break a string in YAML over multiple lines?

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