<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > infidel wrote: > > Where are they-who-hate-us-for-our-whitespace? Are "they" really that > > stupid/petty? Are "they" really out there at all? "They" almost sound > > like a mythical caste of tasteless heathens that "we" have invented. > > It just sounds like so much trivial nitpickery that it's hard to > > believe it's as common as we've come to believe. > > Some of it may be a reaction from "old-timers" who remember FORTRAN, > where (if memory serves), code had to start in column 16 and code > continutations had to be an asterik in column 72 (it's been many years > since I've done any work in FORTRAN, but you get the idea)
Column 7 was the start, 6 the one for continuation; 1-5 and 73-80 were ignored by the compiler and could be used for numbering, grouping &c. Been many years in my case, too, but as I was a mainly-Fortran guru for several years in my career, it's hard to forget;-). > Or it may be a reaction from Assembler, which is also quite > column-centric (is Assembler still taught in schools??). I never used a column-centric Assembler: even the first assemblers I used, in the '70s (6502, Z80, a mini called HP1000, VAX/VMS when it was just out, BAL/370, ...) were all column-indifferent. The HP1000 did not even have a punched-card reader: it used punched _tape_ instead (quite a popular device then, as it came with teletypes typically used as consoles), so keeping track of columns would have a royal mess:-). I'm pretty sure you're still _able_ to take SOME Assembler-based course in most universities, but you need to strive pretty hard for the purpose... it's definitely not in the "default curriculum", even for EEs, much less CSs. Alex -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
