On 25 January 2016 at 21:46, Alan Gauld <alan.ga...@btinternet.com> wrote:
> On 25/01/16 15:52, STF wrote: > > > It's a total fluke. I put the indentation like this to *visually* help > > myself understand what I was going to write. > > That's one of the good things about Python, if it looks right > it very often is right. > Actually, in the original example code I type on notepad, I was using tabs. But since I can't press Tab inside Gmail interface, I pressed spaces instead. My incomprehension is partially due to this YouTube video: https://youtu.be/W1zOj2CI-KQ (@ 7:00) in which the author didn't insist on "consistency". Another reason is that, while tab is interpreted as 4 white spaces in convention, it's shown as 8 white spaces in Notepad. So when I opened some source code, I have different numbers of leading white spaces, which lead to my confusion. Personally, I don't find this as a "good thing". It rather recalls the horrible dreams I have had when I was using Fortran! In Fortran, we have to deal with position of first characters to make things work. IMO, making a visual format an essential thing in programming is a very bad idea, if it's not superficial. > > In the Python tutorial that I was using, the author only told us to use > > indentation, without emphasizing on the size of it. > > Quite right the amount is not important(syntactically at least) provided > you are consistent. > > > As I'm a newbie, I'm mostly using Python IDLE but sometimes I would use > > Programmer's Notepad. > > I don't know PN but IDLE will keep you right most of the time. > > > Let me ask an alternative question. Suppose I have something like this: > > ---- > > > > if condition_C: > > instruction_10 > > instruction_11 > > instruction_12 > > ---- > > There are 4 spaces in front of instruction_10, 3 spaces in front of > > instruction_11 and 5 spaces in front of instruction_12. > > > > What would happen to instruction_11 and instruction_12? > > One of the best things about Python is the interpreter. > Just try it and see. It's much faster than posting a question > here and you can be sure it's the correct answer! If you > don't understand what you see, then come here. > > Just use some print statements or simple assignments > for example: > > >>> if True: > ... print 'in the if' > ... print 'still here' > ... y = 5 * 6 > ... > > what happens? > OK, I have just tried it (instead of just reading source codes) and I see what that gives. IDLE is indeed easier to use than the "DOS-style" Python command-line window. How do you call this thing, BTW? I'm unable to understand how to navigate inside this thing. I mean, when I open it, in which folder am I in? Suppose I have a Python file in D:\mycode\abc\myfile.py. How to run it? Thx _______________________________________________ Tutor maillist - Tutor@python.org To unsubscribe or change subscription options: https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/tutor