Whitespace delimiters suck

[Paul M]

tye4 wrote in message <868bbv$lug at news.or.intel.com>...
[snippage]
>I don't oppose indentation either. It's good for program readability,
and
>readability only. It shouldn't be part of the syntax. Whitespace end
>delimiters are invisible and hence confusing and prone to error.
>I've used some stupid Unix shell languages which fail if I add
whitespace:
>
>Without spaces (this works):
>    $x=10
>    $y=2+2
>
>With spaces (doesn't work):
>    $x  =  10
>    $y  = 2 + 2
>
>I thought they gotten rid of all such languages until I came across
Python.
>Good programming languages should be whitespace tolerant, and most of
them
>are.
>(C++, Java, Ada, BASIC, HTML, Eiffel, Perl, Pascal, ML etc... really
long
>list.)
>
>Why is my question about whitespace raise so many eyebrows? This
feature is
>commonplace.
>
>-tye4


If you are going to spew criticisms (after how many days of using the
language?) please at least get your facts right.  Python IS whitespace
tolerant, your former examples:

    x=10
    y=2+2

and
    x  =  10
    y  =  2 + 2

mean exactly the same thing in Python as you would expect them to in
any of the other languages you cited.

What you were complaining about previously was the use of indentation
for block-delimiting. You suggested that this was a "bad" thing - a
few people agreed that they weren't crazy about indentation, but a
majority of people said they thought it was a good thing (readability,
studies of usability, etc.).  People have managed to write hundreds of
thousands of lines of useful and readable Python code using the
current scheme.

You've now expressed your views on the subject.  Now it is time for
you to assimilate the hard, cold fact that the use of indentation
isn't going to change no matter how much you whine and carry on.  Get
over it and move on.

Do some real programming in the language and decide whether or not
this is a language you want to continue using. If so, then the Python
community looks forward to any real contributions or suggestions you
have to improve the design of the language.  If not, then please do us
all a favor and post your protestations elsewhere.

--Paul