It's far from dead, though. XML is deeply ingrained in many industries and stacks, and will remain so for decades to come, probably until something better than JSON comes along.
There was fresh COBOL code written up until early 1990s too, long past its heyday.
Thing is you couldn't swing a dead cat in 00s without hitting XML. Nearly every job opening had XML listed in requirements. But since mid-2010s you can live your entire career without the need to work on anything XML-related.
But it’s still there and needs to be supported by the OS and tooling. Wether you edit it manually isn’t relevant (and as counterpoint, I do it all the time, for both apps and launchd agents).
