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

On Mon, 26 Aug 2024 08:33:30 -0700
John Ames <commodorejohn@gmail.com> wrote:

On Thu, 22 Aug 2024 08:21:29 -0000 (UTC)
Muttley@dastardlyhq.com wrote:

Yes, this is a royal PITA. I use tabs as in vim I can instantly
change the indentation using "set ts=". With spaces its fixed short
of dicking about with macros.

>
All of this. Are there some safeguards in place for the most egregious
cases? Yes - but literal whitespace is still a horrendous misfeature,
something the world at large has known for so long that it was already
an established joke by the time Ed Post was cracking wise about JCL in
freakin' _Datamation._
>
Python is far from the worst language out there - in fact, it's quite
usable for a wide variety of applications, in spite of that - but the
simple fact that Guido & co. made a boneheaded choice like that is the
reason I'll never be able to *respect* it, even when I do find myself
using it. There should - plain and simple - *never* be a time where you
can end up with unexpected semantic behavior because of settings in
your editor-of-choice.

Literal whitespace also has a knock on effect that I'm guessing Guido didn't
consider. It prevents python being used in command line shell pipes for
anything useful unlike perl and awk.