CamelCase versus wide_names (Prothon)

[Roy Smith]

François Pinard <pinard at iro.umontreal.ca> wrote:
> Given full power and choice, what I would prefer is that identifiers be
> allowed to contain spaces -- would they have to be unbreakable spaces.
> That would be the most legible avenue, especially given that my editors
> and enscripters would then bold or colour Python/Prothon keywords, making
> it clear the extent of each identifier.

That's an interesting point.  Most computer languages are written in 
ASCII.  Typographic embelishments(*) like font, size, color, and so on 
are all ignored.  It's only relatively recently that case has become 
significant.

By contrast, the languages of math (maths to you silly Europeans), 
science, and engineering are full of wonderful typography.  Different 
fonts, character sets, diacritical marks, character placement, and 
special symbols are all meaningful.  For the most part, we struggle 
along with things like

$ sum from x = 0 to inf [ pi sup x * j hat * omega dot ] $

when what we'd write with pen and paper looks nothing like that.  
Someday, when we finally break out of the 80-column, fixed width, 
monochrome, monofont, monosize, 7-bit world, our arguments about 
wide_name vs. bumpyCase will seem just as pre-historic as the $$ 
gibberish above.

(*) Granted, what I call an "embellishement", many people would call 
"the ability to use all the letters in my native alphabet".