howto: reference top level field that is not a valid identifier

[Rots]

https://cuelang.org/docs/tutorials/tour/references/selectors/

if I have a top-level field that is not a valid identifier, how can I refer to it? I.e. what should put as a value for expectB to refer to ":a"

":a": "b"
d: ":e": "f"
expectF: d.":e"
expectB: (":a")

Is it possible to reference the root or navigate through explicitly referring to the parent of the entry?

[jpluscplusm]

As well as the documentation added above, which assumes the ability to add to the on-disk CUE, let's also include (as a separate howto?) the export-CLI-only solution I mentioned here: https://github.com/cue-lang/cue/issues/358#issuecomment-1585796671

[jpluscplusm]

Closed via https://github.com/cue-lang/cuelang.org/commit/68e815abc6fff3c2620023cd0b37b37ce3fe8b0b and https://github.com/cue-lang/cuelang.org/commit/8b67f643a1a192e3b52bc1b199f94172bb76fc21

[jpluscplusm]

@Rots Please let me know if/that these new docs answer your question!

• https://alpha.cuelang.org/docs/howto/export-fields-whose-names-are-not-valid-identifiers/
• https://alpha.cuelang.org/docs/howto/refer-to-fields-whose-names-are-not-valid-identifiers/

[Rots]

Yes, that's great! Did that now require also software changes? If yes, in which release will it be available? 0.7.0?

[jpluscplusm]

Yes, that's great!

Fab :-)

Did that now require also software changes?

No - "alpha" is just our way of referring to the next version of the cuelang.org website. The methods outlined should already work with recent CUE releases.

If yes, in which release will it be available? 0.7.0?

It /definitely/ works with 0.7.0, as that's the version that the alpha website uses, and these examples are tested against it.