Are there other languages similar in purpose to XML?

Question

I ask this because i find XML to be visually unappealing. I understand that XML is extremely famous, useful, and that it is accepted by most, if not all, programmers as a very useful language for defining and structuring data; however, i really do not find staring at it, looking at it, or reading it very appealing. I'm just a student and I am quite certain i'm going to have to deal with it sooner or later, but i was just wondering if there are alternatives to XML.

Answer 1

Take a look at YAML, or JSON.

There's also a pretty nice Wikipedia article for a Comparison of data serialization formats.