API change: unit and machine nodes

[William Reade]

On Fri, 2011-12-23 at 10:59 -0200, Gustavo Niemeyer wrote:
> It feels strange to be storing exactly the same type of information in
> different formats depending on where we're looking at. I suggest
> storing the unaltered strings in the former format across the board.

My point is that it's not *exactly* the same type of information; there
are certainly similarities, but there's a clear distinction between
"partial input" and "complete output".

Partial input, I think we're agreed, works great as a list of strings.
Complete output, I think we also agree, works great as a dict (for easy
consumption by the provider). From my perspective, your suggestion is to
add an intermediate format for the complete output data (ie, two string
lists plus a string, which can then be transformed into a dict later);
and I don't really see the benefit of this intermediate format. Expand
please?

Cheers
William