Re: OT: Programming Languages (Was: Spell Checking for Non European Languages, and for Conlangs)

"Mark J. Reed":
> On Wed, Mar 31, 2004 at 12:38:13AM +0200, Henrik Theiling wrote:
> > Chris Bates <christopher.bates@...> writes:
> > > their code it hinders readability a lot. I love the way python deals
> > > with blocks... indentation only...
> >
> > Oh, yes.  It's my point of view, too.  Modern languages *must* have
> > use indentation.  It removes many traps.
>
> It also removes any ability to sanity-check.  With keyword block
> boundaries, it's possible to write plugins for your favorite editor that
> automatically verify that the indentation and keywords agree.  When the
> indentation *is* the structure, there's nothing to check against.  It
> also removes the ability to use indentation to make particular lines of
> code stand out, a very useful device for temporary debugging statements.
> etc.
Being a syntactician and not a programmer, I wonder why programmers
don't use trees. An interface like the one used for Windows directory
structure (where you click on nodes to expand and contract them) seems
ideal. Surely programmers can't be guilty of a kind of cerebrally
masochistic machismo?

--And.

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