Re: [jamboost] Jam's space-sensitivity

From: Toon Knapen (toon.knapen_at_[hidden])
Date: 2005-01-26 09:42:09

Zbynek Winkler wrote:
> Vladimir Prus wrote:
> 
> 
>>Hi,
>>all most of you know, Jam is sensitive to spaces. A typical first user's error 
>>is:
>>
>> exe a : a.cpp;
>>
>>The attached patch attempts to fix that. Now, whenever bjam sees ';' outside 
>>of quited string, it terminates the current token.
>> 
>>
> 
> It was my first user error too ;-). However, the rule is simple and 
> works for all cases - just put spaces everywhere. I think there is a 
> certain beauty to the simplicity. I'd suggest instead to detect this 
> particular case but return error saying that this is the most often 
> first time error and that spaces are needed everywhere. I think it would 
> help the users more in this way...
> 
> 

I agree overall. Most important is that things are consistent. So you 
can't write:

exe a:a.cpp;

but instead need to write:

exe a : a.cpp ;

If now you drop the requirement of having a space between 'a.cpp' and 
';', people will also forget about the space between 'a' and ':'. And if 
you can't drop the requirement of having a space between the latter I 
would not drop the first requirement either.

And indeed, if you can detect the error it is better to give a clear 
error message and argument the reason why.