Without stating an opinion one way or the other about how much Guido knows about language design or whether he was focussed only on syntax, I have to point out that languages with impeccable pedigree like Miranda and Haskell implement the off-side rule. (Miranda dates to the mid-80s so that predates Python by about 5 years.) I've never used Miranda but I have to say that using indention to control scope works surprisingly well in Haskell. However, for some reason, I find it annoying in Python. Perhaps it's because functions tend to be rather short in Haskell. (That and, yes, Python needs a real lamdba.)
As for the perl fragment in question, the camel book actually talks about when it's good style or not. However, it's at work and I'm at home. I think it's something like "put the important clause first"
As for my weapon of choice, when I'm not being paid, it's almost surely Ocaml. It's mostly functional, has a powerful, terse syntax and has a really good native code compiler.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2004-11-10 01:41 am (UTC)As for the perl fragment in question, the camel book actually talks about when it's good style or not. However, it's at work and I'm at home. I think it's something like "put the important clause first"
As for my weapon of choice, when I'm not being paid, it's almost surely Ocaml. It's mostly functional, has a powerful, terse syntax and has a really good native code compiler.