How to encode special characters in a list?

[edeutsch]

There will be a need to encode special characters in the data that will sometimes interfere with parsing. We should address this in the spec.

Proposed general rules:

• A backslash anywhere in the description line MUST be escaped with the backslash character
• Open and close parentheses or square brackets in the data MUST be escaped with the backslash character
• A pipe character ( | ) in pipe-separated-value (PSV) fields MUST be escaped with the backslash character, but only MAY be separated in ordinary fields

In a scalar value:
Wrong: \GName=EPB\41
Correct: \GName=EPB\41
Wrong: \Comment=I like \crazy characters
Correct: \Comment=I like \crazy characters
Wrong: \Comment=I like parentheses like this ()
Correct: \Comment=I like parentheses like this ()

In a list:
Wrong: \PName=(Nucleolar protein \NOP5)(Nucleolar protein 5(five))
Correct: \PName=(Nucleolar protein \NOP5)(Nucleolar protein 5(five))
Wrong: \PName=(EPB\41)(PAR)53)(PAR[53])
Correct: \PName=(EPB\41)(PAR)53)(PAR[53])
Correct: \PName=(sp|O75530|EED_HUMAN) okay because \PName is not a PSV field
Correct: \PName=(sp|O75530|EED_HUMAN)
Wrong: \VariantSimple=(1|I)(21|K|dbSNP|COS[]MIC) if the optionalTag is "dbSNP|COS[]MIC"
Correct: \VariantSimple=(1|I)(21|K|dbSNP|COS[]MIC)
Correct: \VariantSimple=(1|I)(21|K|[dbSNP][COS[]MIC])

icky. But it must be dealt with. XML neatly avoids all these problems.

What do you think?

[edeutsch]

ah, it looks like GitHub has neatly removed some backslashes, so the above examples make no sense. We'll need to move this issue to a Google doc or something to preserve formatting.