Re: [boost] Tabs creep back into source files

From: David Abrahams (dave_at_[hidden])
Date: 2002-09-09 11:01:11

From: "Terje Slettebø" <tslettebo_at_[hidden]>

> How does this apply to tabs? More or less all editors have support for
tabs,
> and for setting the tab size. Do you mean to say that because some may
use
> Notepad to write programs, others won't be able to benefit from using the
> tab size they prefer?

No, I'm saying that just as with variable-pitch fonts, when source code is
written using tabs it's much more likely that something the author intended
won't be properly communicated because it's harder to control horizontal
alignment.

> >> - They tell logically what it's about, while spaces carry no such
> >> information.
> >
> >Huh?
>
> What I meant is that a tab is kind of like markup information in the
source.
> The tabs tell that this is indentation.
>
> As I understand, the reason for this is mostly that it's hard to check
that
> the practice is being followed. So tabs are banned, as that is easier to
> check for.

Yes. In fact it's impossible to check programmatically whether the practice
is being followed. In general you need to know the author's intention in
order to discern how things were meant to be aligned.

-----------------------------------------------------------
           David Abrahams * Boost Consulting
dave_at_[hidden] * http://www.boost-consulting.com