Re: Use of punctuation in a language?

  Robert A Duff <bobduff@shell01.TheWorld.com> wrote:
  [ ... a bunch of good stuff, most of which I agree with and
              have snipped from this followup... However: ]
>
> I don't like languages with significant end-of-lines, because you
> inevitably end up needing to write something longer than a physical line
> (on a piece of paper, or in a window), and then you need some kludgery
> to say "this particular end-of-line is not a terminator".


IMHO, a backslash at the end of a line is hardly "kludgery".




> > > [ It's a little easier for
> > > compilers to parse languages with statement separators and explicit
> > > brackets, but I don't find that anywhere near as compelling as the
> > > human factors involved. -John]


Worth repeating :-)


> Or is it our tie to the 7-bit ascii character set that causes trouble?


It would be cool to be able to use those European-style
double-angle quotation marks. Too bad different countries
use them with opposite meanings.


> P.S. Thanks to our esteemed moderator for allowing us to chat about
> language design issues. They're at least *related* to compilers (as are
> linkers, debuggers, etc), and anyway, where else can language design be
> discussed intelligently?


comp.lang.functional sometimes, with an FP focus;
comp.lang.misc sometimes.


Several web fora and mailing lists:


Lambda, the Ultimate Programming Languages weblog
    ( http://lambda.weblogs.com/ and/or
        http://lambda.weblogs.com/discuss/?mode=day )


The Pragmatic Programmers' mailing list
        http://groups.yahoo.com/group/pragprog/


The yahoo "langsmiths" mailing list
        http://groups.yahoo.com/group/langsmiths/


Occasionally, Joel on Software's discussion area,
        http://discuss.fogcreek.com/joelonsoftware/default.asp
--
        Doug Landauer landauer@got.dot.net.invalid

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