On 04/20/10 03:52, Warp wrote:
>   Why is it idiotic? Because whitespace is the one thing which gets most
> easily and regularly lost in communication.
> 
>   For example, someone might ask some question about Python in a forum or
> blog post, and then someone might answer it with some Python code... and
> the blog/forum software removes whitespaces from the beginning of lines,
> completely changing the meaning of the program and making it inoperable.
> There are also many other situations where whitespaces at the beginning
> of lines might not be preserved (or might be changed somehow).

	You know, for all the complaints people have about Python's whitespace,
not once in all the years of coding Python has it been an issue for me.

	Well, OK - occasionally had issues with people mixing tabs with spaces,
but then I learned to use a proper editor.<G>

	Know how often I've had issues compiling because of a missing brace or
semicolon? Orders of magnitude more frequently than whitespace issues in
Python.

	Once I had spent just a short amount of time in the Python world, I
really hated semicolons in whatever other language I was coding in. A
royal pain to have to enter a mostly pointless character after each
statement.

	Most online forums have a [code] tag or something similar to ensure
nothing gets formatted. Otherwise, use a pasting service.

>   Also autoindentation of Python code is a physical impossibility.

	Why would this be a concern?

>   The person who thought that it's a good idea to have indentation as
> block delimiters should be shot.

	Shoot me while you're at it, too ;-)

	Python's the only whitespace sensitive language I've dealt with where
it wasn't an issue.

-- 
Growing old is mandatory; growing up is optional!!

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