Re: Python (was Re: I did not inhale)

On 27/08/2024 17:03, John Ames wrote:

On Tue, 27 Aug 2024 15:10:08 +0200
David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> wrote:
 

(6) You want to add extra statements to the end of a block, but
where IS the end? You have to INFER the ending by looking for a
line with a smaller indent. But suppose you're at the bottom of a
window; is that bottom line the last in the block, or is there
another one at the same indent just out of sight? You have to
tentatively keep peeking ahead!

>
Keep your blocks small and neat.

 That's very much one for the "good advice that is not always feasible
in the Real World" file. Every project has its own natural balance of
"large things that can be easily re-factored into sets of small things"
(i.e. things you can function-ize) vs. "large things that cannot."
 

Sure.  But if you keep such advice at hand, then it is often easier to make it feasible.  Occasionally code is best formatted with a big function or two, but most of the time it is possible and preferable to have relatively small function.

(6a) And maybe there's big comment blocking in the middle of block;
comments don't need nesting! If there are lots of comments and few
statements, finding the end of the block (ie. the last statement of
this block) can become quite an exercise.

>
That applies to every programming language (unless you know of one
that doesn't support comments).

 It applies very much moreso to languages where comments *must* follow
the indentation level of the surrounding code, so that the deeper you
go, the more lines you have to split comments across.
 

It is not common to have to have indent comment lines (certainly in Python it is not necessary).  And if you find yourself writing large comments in the middle of a block in the middle of a function, it is probably time to consider re-organising the code and/or the comments and documentation.  (Again, there can be exceptions to this general rule.)