This is a sub-issue of #1910624: [META] Introduce and complete configuration schemas in all of core.
Problem/motivation
#1866610: Introduce Kwalify-inspired schema format for configuration introduced the idea of config schema. The changelog leads to (hopefully extensive) documentation on the format at http://drupal.org/node/1905070. While there are little cleanups planned for the format overall, the current format is a result of months of back and forths, so it should be perfectly fine to apply it more widely to core.
Proposed solution
Create a configuration schema for field module.
Schema in place
Schema not yet in place
field.settings.yml