I hate you all

[Timothy Madden]

On 06.04.2013 06:53, Ian Kelly wrote:
> On Fri, Apr 5, 2013 at 6:22 PM,  <terminatorul at gmail.com> wrote:
>> The correct tab stop positions have always been at 8 character columns apart.
>> The "ambiguity" was introduced by editors that do not follow the default value set in hardware like printers or used by consoles and terminal emulators.
>
> 8 characters is common, but no more "correct" than any other, as tab
> width has never been standardized.  You talk of not wanting tab
> options imposed on you, but consider that treating tabs as 8-character
> stops imposes that setting on anybody who needs to work with your
> mixed-indentation code.
>
>> And now python forces me out of using any tab characters at all. I believe I should still have a choice, python should at lest give an option to set tab size, if the default of 8 is ambiguous now.
>
> And then changing that setting could change the meaning of the code,
> which would be a disaster for code that you want to distribute.
>

8-character tab stops should be the default. Debating that is I believe 
another topic, and compatibility with python2 should be enough to make 
that debate unnecessary.

You are right, to change the tab size means to change the meaning of the 
code, and that would be wrong. Can't argue with that.

What I want is an option to use the tabs as I have used them in the 
past, with the default size. Since "ambiguity" about the tab size 
appears to be the cause for new python 3 rules, I though of an option 
the make that size explicit. I still think users should somehow have a 
way to use a tab stop of their choice, but how this could be achieved 
properly is another problem.

I guess a discussion like this thread is the price to be paid for 
relying solely on white space to delimit code blocks, like the python 
syntax does.

Thank you,
Timothy Madden