On 25/07/2016 03:37, Steven D'Aprano wrote:
On Mon, 25 Jul 2016 08:13 am, BartC wrote:
A solid end-of-block symbol (as you get with 'else' and 'except' because
then you KNOW that's the end of that block) would have been welcome with
the Python indent scheme.
A solid end-of-block symbol would have been entire redundant and
unnecessary. You know when the block ends: it ends when one of two things
happen:
- you dedent out a level;
- you reach the end of file;
whichever happens next. Requiring an otherwise pointless end of block
delimiter to protect against your cat walking over your keyboard, or clumsy
programmers who accidentally hit keys and don't notice, is not a virtue. It
doesn't make the language better. It just increases friction when writing
code.
Remember when movies used to finish with "The End"? I wonder what that
was all about? After all you can tell when it's finished when you see
the opening titles of the next movie! Or when the lights come back up in
the cinema ('theater').
If you've ever watched Monty Python (on topic!) and the Holy Grail at
the cinema, you will have appreciated it even more. You just get a black
screen and nothing more happens. People were waiting for several
minutes, eventually starting to get up and leave.
END may seem redundant, but it's just very handy. You know FOR SURE you
are at a particular point, instead of having to infer it from what may
or may not come next, which might not be visible off the bottom of the
screen.
When you're typing plain English paragraphs like this, why don't you end
each sentence with "END"
The period is more the equivalent of C's semicolon. That nearly always
coincides with end-or-line so also lends itself to be inferred, as
horizontally source code tends to be a limited width.
But otherwise free-flowing English text is not a good comparison with a
programming language syntax.
--
Bartc
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