Why tuples use parentheses ()'s instead of something else like <>'s?

[Reinhold Birkenfeld]

Roy Smith wrote:
> "John Roth" <newsgroups at jhrothjr.com> wrote:
>> > If Python had originally been invented in a unicode world, I suppose we
>> > wouldn't have this problem.  We'd just be using guillemots for tuples
>> > (and have keyboards which made it easy to type them).
>> 
>> I suppose the forces of darkness will forever keep Python from
>> requiring utf-8 as the source encoding. If I didn't make a fetish
>> of trying to see the good in everybody's position, I could really
>> work up a dislike of the notion that you should be able to use
>> any old text editor for Python source.

> In any case, it's a good thing that Python can be edited with "any old 
> text editor", because that lowers the price of entry.  I like emacs, the 
> next guy likes vi, or vim, or notepad, or whatever.  Nothing is keeping 
> folks who like IDEs from inventing and using them, but I would have been 
> a lot less likely to experiment with Python the first time if it meant 
> getting one of them going just so I could run "Hello, world".

Perl6 experiments with the use of guillemots as part of the syntax. I
shall be curious to see how this is accepted, of course only if Perl6 is
ever going to see the light of day, which is an exciting matter of its
own...

> With google as my witness, I predict that in 30 years from now, ASCII 
> will be as much a dinosaur as a keypunch is today, and our children and 
> grandchildren will both wonder how their ancestors ever managed to write 
> programs without guillemots and be annoyed that they actually have to 
> type on a keyboard to make the computer understand them.

Well, it's not clear if they will still "write" programs...

Reinhold