Github Pages error: yaml file query returns an empty file

Question

I have a static website repo hosted with Github Pages. The javascript must load two text files (.yml files more precisely) stored in that same repo in a data folder. The functions used to load the two files are the following:

async function readTextFile(path) {
    console.log("Path:", path);
    const response = await fetch(path);
    console.log("Response:", response);
    const text = await response.text();
    console.log("Text:", text);
    return text;
}
export async function loadBodiesData() {
    const content = await readTextFile("./data/kspbodies.yml");
    /* Some post processing */
}
export async function loadConfig() {
    const content = await readTextFile("./data/settings.yml");
    /* Some post processing */
}

The kspbodies.yml file is correctly loaded and its content displayed in the console (Text: ...). The settings.yml file however appears to be empty (Text: <empty string>). The file exists as a direct look at this file from its URL doesn't throw a 404 error, but returns an empty file (0 byte size).

• Here is the live demo : https://krafpy.github.io/KSP-MGA-Planner/ (open the dev console)
• The source repo : https://github.com/Krafpy/KSP-MGA-Planner/tree/yaml-load-fail
  • kspbodies.yml and settings.yml are located in /data
  • the code above is located in /dist/main/utilities/data.js and are called from /dist/main/main.js

What I have tried

• Waiting for several hours in case it was needed for all files to be "detected"
• Renaming settings.yml into something else
• Creating a new file with the same content as settings.yml, its URL returns an empty file as well

Note: The website works perfectly on a local server.

Does anyone know where this problem comes from and how to fix it ?

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

Alright I found the problem. It actually comes from the syntax used in the yaml files. The first characters in the file seem to matter. I experimented with the content of a YAML file and here are the results when loaded through the hosted github page:

• Simplest content: loads correctly

test: 42

• Added --- and ... as documented in the Wikipedia page for YAML: loads an empty file

---
test: 42
...

• Added a comment before the ---: loads correctly

# Test file
---
test: 42
...

So it seems that having a YAML file starting with --- makes the content of the file being ignored by the server. There is probably a difference in syntax standards used between github servers and vscode live server for yaml files.