On Sun, 2001-12-09 at 13:00, Chuck Esterbrook wrote: > Scaling everything down to the most extreme people (the guy using an 80 > column terminal who prints and e-mails all of his code) hurts for those > who aren't (those with the space, the friendly editor and the > inclination to use them). Whereever you draw the line, someone is > gaining and someone is losing. That's where the constroversy comes from. > > Also, instead of changing how I code in Python, shouldn't editors like > emacs do the right thing? Python is the first language I've used where > I was expected to cater to a single editor (and one with source) > instead of expecting the editor to handle the language's text files. > That seems like hubris. > > You say "no, I won't do this and I won't do that for your source", but > then expect me to say "yes, I'll do this and I'll do that for one > problematic editor". That seems unbalanced.
I am saying you should do these things because they are compatible with the dominant style in the larger Python community. I set up my environment to fit with those conventions -- perhaps it isn't a flexible enough environment for you, but as long as code stays more-or-less within those basic conventions my environment works quite well for me. If all Python code used tabs, then I could set up Emacs to use tabs just fine too. When I have to go back and forth it becomes problematic. By going against the dominant style, you force me to choose how I will set up my environment. When I spoke of hubris, I was refering to this: making someone choose between Webware and almost all the other Python code out there. When I was first using Webware, I actually did try to stick to guidelines. I changed Emacs so it would do tabs by default. I even converted a fair bit of my own code. But I eventually went back, because then it was annoying when I was editing code from other sources. The result is it's fine for me to edit other code, but annoying for me to deal with Webware code. It also means that packages designed specifically for use with Webware -- Cheetah and FunFormKit -- are not going to be written to Webware style guidelines. There are reasons I like 80 columns and spaces for indentation. But really, that's not the important issue. If a concensus had grown to do these things otherwise, I would not complain and I would adapt the configuration of my tools. For big issues -- like whether to have all attribute access be through functions -- the arguments for it are significant. I happen to agree with it -- but even if I didn't, I'd be able to understand that any incongruity with other code was for a real purpose. It's because these small style issues are so small that they seem more annoying. Really, no justification for or against them seems to stack up against convention and compatibility. Ian _______________________________________________ Webware-devel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/webware-devel
