In eclipse I always have 'show formatting characters' on. It replaces spaces with middle-dots, tabs with the >> (as a single character), and newlines with paragraph symbols, all in a colour that's so light grey it's bordering on white (which is the background). You barely notice it when looking at code, but problems with spacing immediately jump out at you.
That makes spaces and tabs not so invisible. Nevertheless, yes, of course, we should get our collective heads out of the 70s and move on from an (arguably glorified) model of dumping raw characters into a raw character buffer and then compiling that. Sigh. Maybe that code bubbles IDE will do a little more for us in that regard. On Jun 29, 5:08 pm, Robert Casto <[email protected]> wrote: > Can't we just move on from simple text files and use something better to > hold our source code? Why always such an unwieldy medium? Seriously, why do > we have to use ASCII text files anyway? Couldn't we put something in place > that would get rid of the parts we don't want the compiler to see? A > pre-processor that gets rid of all the formatting, comments, or whatever > else we want to put into the files. They would become smart documents that > we happen to compile down to something the computer could run. Personally, > I'm tired of all the debate about spaces, tabs, and other formatting. How > about every programmer sets their own rules for how they like to see the > code. They check check it back in and voila, the file is stored in a > standardized format. The next developer could see the code just how they > like it. > > Spaces and tabs are invisible. What we need is more formatting like we have > in word processing documents. Let me put an image into the code. A link to a > document. Anything. When it compiles, only the programming parts will be > seen by the compiler. Until then though, we are all wasting a lot of time > dealing with a file format that is beyond ancient. > > > > > > On Tue, Jun 29, 2010 at 10:50 AM, Lyle <[email protected]> wrote: > > Reinier's Rules (ha!) are the best argument I've seen for tab characters > > infiltrating source files, but when the bits hit the disk I agree with Ben. > > For collaborative work, it's often tough enough to get people to indent > > logically and consistently with just *one* type of whitespace character. > > > -Lyle > > > On Tue, Jun 29, 2010 at 9:35 AM, B Smith-Mannschott <[email protected] > > > wrote: > > >> On Tue, Jun 29, 2010 at 14:41, Reinier Zwitserloot <[email protected]> > >> wrote: > >> > I don't understand the tabs v. spaces war. There's clearly a right > >> > answer: > > >> > Tabs for indents. Spaces for spacing. > > >> That's my thinking too! And yet I'm still an acolyte of "tabs are > >> evil". It's too easy to screw up in practice. I have little confidence > >> that most programmers are aware enough of what white space they are > >> typing to stick to these rules consistently. > > > -- > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > > "The Java Posse" group. > > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > > [email protected]<javaposse%2bunsubscr...@googlegroups > > .com> > > . > > For more options, visit this group at > >http://groups.google.com/group/javaposse?hl=en. > > -- > Robert Castowww.IWantFreeShipping.com > Find Amazon Filler Items easily! -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "The Java Posse" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/javaposse?hl=en.
