[Tutor] (no subject)

[Brian van den Broek]

Adam Cripps said unto the world upon 2005-03-06 02:38:
> On Fri, 04 Mar 2005 12:14:28 -0500, Brian van den Broek
> <bvande at po-box.mcgill.ca> wrote:
> 
>>Kevin said unto the world upon 2005-03-04 10:43:
>>
>>>Hello all. I have just completed my very first python program just a
>>>simple number guessing. I would like for someone to try it out if they
>>>could and let me know how I did with it and where I could have
>>>improved apon it. There are t files main.py and defs.py
>>>
>>>Thanks
>>
>>Hi Kevin,
>>
>>Though I am a learner, too, I have a few comments. They are more about
>>style than substance.
>>
>>1) A lot of your code comments get in the way of my reading and easily
>>understanding the code. Consider:
>>
>>.# leading `.'s to foil google groups and other whitespace stripping
>>readers

<SNIP>

> <snip>
> 
> Is the tutor list mirrored on usenet such as google groups? I've
> searched and not found it. I think it's a bit harsh to blame the style
> on a client that strips white-space, where he has no control over it.
> Are we not better off using another client?

Hi Adam,

I don't know if tutor is viewable through google groups or not. 
However, it has proved a problem on comp.lang.python, where I picked 
up the leading '.' trick. Noting that Kevin (the OP) was using a gmail 
account and not knowing if the google groups' leading whitespace 
stripping `feature' was also a gmail feature, I figured it would be 
better to be safe and put the possibly needless '.'s in.

It would indeed have been harsh to complain about his whitespace if it 
were google-striped whitespace at issue. But, when I commented upon 
the lack of whitespace in his code, I said

B> Whitespace is a good thing. Python needs it horizontally, but
B> you can (and, IMHO, should) employ vertical whitespace to chunk
B> up the code.

So, it is a different issue.

> I use gmail to collect this kind of email and using the recent thread
> entitle "Reading Tutor with gmail: monospace fonts" have managed to
> make my mail monospace, which makes it a lot easier to read.  None of
> the whitespace was stripped in my mail, and the style looked fine. 

That is good to know; I won't worry next time.


> In fact, by littering it with '.' you are making it more of a task to run
> this script, as you have to strip all the '.' out first - a real pain.

A bummer, yes. And one to blame on google groups -- it is much less of 
a pain than loosing all leading whitespace. But, not too much a pain, 
either (we are programming here, right ;-) :

<untested code>
# assuming the code has been saved to a .py file whose lines
# are available for iteration in python_file

stripped_lines = []

for line in python_file:
     if line.startswith('.'):
         line = line[1:]
     stripped_lines.append(line)

# write the stripped_line to the original .py file, and you're
# good to go.
</code>

Best,

Brian vdB