I hate you all

[Roy Smith]

In article <5160cc44$0$29995$c3e8da3$5496439d at news.astraweb.com>,
 Steven D'Aprano <steve+comp.lang.python at pearwood.info> wrote:

> On Sun, 07 Apr 2013 01:20:32 +1100, Chris Angelico wrote:
> 
> > On Sun, Apr 7, 2013 at 12:52 AM, Nobody <nobody at nowhere.com> wrote:
> >> Historically, software and hardware which assigns a meaning to a tab
> >> character has come in two flavours:
> >>
> >> 1. Tab stops are every 8 columns; this cannot be changed. 2. Tab stops
> >> are configurable, defaulting to every 8 columns.
> > 
> > 3. Tab stops are measured in something other than characters.
> > 
> > With variable-width fonts, it's illogical to set tab stops in
> > characters. DeScribe Word Processor defined them in centimeters, way
> > back in the early... well, I didn't meet it till the 90s, but I don't
> > know how long it had been around before that.
> 
> 
> Am I the only one here who has used a typewriter?
> 
> Tab stops were set manually, to a physical distance into the page, using 
> a mechanical stop. This long predates the "rule" that tab stops are every 
> 8 characters.

Yup.  I learned on a good old manual, with mechanical "Tab Set" and "Tab 
Clear" function.

Of course, on an 029, you set the tab stops by punching a drum card.

> If your editor doesn't support setting tab stops to at least single pixel 
> resolution, it's not supporting tabs, it's supporting something else that 
> it merely calls "tabs".

Yup.  I use emacs.  "M-X edit tab stops" does that.  Like so much else 
about emacs, I haven't used that feature in years (gee, maybe decades), 
but it's nice to know it's there.