From: Ben F. <big...@be...> - 2006-10-12 02:22:18
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Alan G Isaac <ai...@am...> writes: > On Thu, 12 Oct 2006, Ben Finney apparently wrote: > > The recommendations for indentation in Python have nothing to do > > with how many columns a tab stop represents. > > Why not? It serves as a reminder that a tab stop represents > whatever number of columns we want it to, and that in a prominent > situation the natural number is 4 (and not, say, some number > dictated by the default in someone's preferred editor). Nor is it, say, some number that a particular programming community finds convenient by convention. Editors default to 8 columns for tab stops, not because that's what someone arbitrarily prefers, but because that's how the TAB character is, by its historical definition, interpreted in text. Like it or not, since that time the overwhelmingly common interpretation matches the historical definition. Anything else is *not* a default, but a customisation, peculiar to an individual or community. I'm all for allowing *customisation* from the default of 8 columns -- I think it's far too wide -- but to declare the *default* as anything other than 8 columns is completely arbitrary and ignores the rest of the world. -- \ "First they came for the verbs, and I said nothing, for verbing | `\ weirds language. Then, they arrival for the nouns and I speech | _o__) nothing, for I no verbs." -- Peter Ellis | Ben Finney |