[Doc-SIG] Some random thoughts

[Laurence Tratt]

David Ascher wrote:

[The First line indenting problem]
[Laurie]
>> I nearly did that, but my personal preference is to cut down on
>> these sorts of assumptions where possible. My thinking was (without
>> wishing to start a flame war), this sort of auto-pseudo-intelligence
>> is quite Perl like and tends to lead one into troubles in the future
>> when one finds a need to break the assumption to allow something else
>> to work...
> At the risk of offending

Don't worry about that. We're not exactly into John Cleese on a battlement
insults yet <wink>.

> it should process the standard docstrings appropriately --

OK, I'm going to qualify my earlier statement: if the first line indent rule
(Pings or Edwards) is incorporated into the standard rules, I'd be happy.
What I'm not happy with is tools adding "pseudo intelligence" on top of a
standard. Standards make our life easier in the long run, and I think that -
for better or for worse - they should be adhered to except in extreme
circumstances.

I admit that the standard needs, er, more standardising.

> alternatively, you can submit one mondo patch and fight that battle.

In my opinion when / if we standardise on a set of rules, someone will
almost certainly need to go through the standard library and bring things
into line. The main reason this is necessary is that, as of the 1.5.2
library at least, there isn't a standard within the library (and thus many
files aren't StructuredText compatible). Mercifully I don't think this will
be a long or difficult job which is a consolation!


Laurie