Who are the "spacists"?

[Joel Goldstick]

On Mon, Mar 20, 2017 at 1:39 PM, Steve D'Aprano
<steve+python at pearwood.info> wrote:
> On Tue, 21 Mar 2017 02:40 am, Tobiah wrote:
>
>>> I wonder whether the tabs versus spaces divide is closely aligned to the
>>> Windows versus Unix/Linux divide?
>>>
>>> It seems to me that Unix users are typically going to be using Unix tools
>>> which often assume spaces are used for indentation, and consequently cope
>>> badly with tabs.
>>
>> I can't think of any classic Unix tool that behaves in a way that would
>> support this point of view.
>
> And yet I'm forever being told by my Linux sys admin work mates "don't use
> tabs, because they break everything". For another example, see JMZ's essay
> (its already been linked to twice in this thread, look it up).
>
> We've had a similar attitude right here from Marko, who insists that
> anything except 8-column tabs is the Devil's Work. (Or something like
> that -- to be perfectly honest, I'm not really sure I understand *what*
> Marko's objection is.)
>
> So okay, if tabs work fine with Unix tools, why do so many Unix people avoid
> tabs as if they were radioactive plague?
>
>
>
>
> --
> Steve
> “Cheer up,” they said, “things could be worse.” So I cheered up, and sure
> enough, things got worse.
>
> --
> https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list

I was the first to post that this topic would go nowhere.  77 posts
later, for some reason the word 'spaceist' bothers me.  Why do people
debate spaces versus tabs?  I don't think it has to do with spaces or
tabs, but something more sociological or psychological.

-- 
Joel Goldstick
http://joelgoldstick.com/blog
http://cc-baseballstats.info/stats/birthdays