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| From | David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> |
|---|---|
| Newsgroups | comp.lang.misc |
| Subject | Re: Removing influences from a language |
| Date | 2025-11-10 14:13 +0100 |
| Organization | A noiseless patient Spider |
| Message-ID | <10esoec$j6i$1@dont-email.me> (permalink) |
| References | (8 earlier) <10erdir$3lupj$2@dont-email.me> <10ere59$3ljha$2@dont-email.me> <10erng6$3o93c$1@dont-email.me> <10es6su$3rf3r$2@dont-email.me> <10esgjv$3u6qk$1@dont-email.me> |
On 10/11/2025 12:00, bart wrote:
> On 10/11/2025 08:14, David Brown wrote:
>> On 10/11/2025 04:51, Lawrence D’Oliveiro wrote:
>>> On Mon, 10 Nov 2025 01:12:10 +0000, bart wrote:
>>>
>>>> I also have a small problem with all those trailing commas.
>>>
>>> I don’t. I use them to indicate that there’s nothing special about the
>>> last item in the list, you can add more after that if you want. This
>>> is usually the case in high-level languages.
>>>
>>
>> Trailing commas also make such tables and lists easier to maintain.
>> You can cut, copy and paste more easily, and adding new items only
>> affects the new lines - it does not mean changing existing lines. In
>> a world of git, svn, and other version control software, it is a
>> significant advantage if changes to code only affect the lines that
>> have a meaningful change.
>
> Yeah, I made the same point about semicolons in the one of the A68
> threads, and I was just insulted.
I haven't followed all the posts there (since I don't know Algol), so I
can't comment on that.
>
> However, by trailing commas here, I meant the ones at the end of each
> line when lists are laid out one item per line.
That is what is meant by "trailing commas". What else might it mean?
enum colours = {
red,
green,
blue,
purple,
pale_fushia_with_a_hint_of_orange,
};
>
> I was looking at ways to eliminate those, as semicolons are in many
> languages, or at least made optional.
How did we get back to semicolons here? You said they were "solved".
(I don't know what that means, since I don't know why you think they are
a problem in the first place, but that's for a different branch of the
thread.) We are talking here about trailing commas in lists.
>
> Tabulated data in printed material usually doesn't have such punctuation.
Tabulated data in printed material is for human consumption. It can be
formatted in countless ways - often with significant spaces, perhaps
grid lines, and perhaps punctuation. That has no relevance in this context.
>
>
>
>>
>>> In C code, on the other hand, the last item in an array is often a
>>> sentinel to indicate the end of the list, e.g.
>>>
>>> static PyMethodDef discipline_methods[] =
>>> {
>>> {"makedict", discipline_makedict, METH_VARARGS,
>>> "makedict(«tuple of pairs», «message»)\n\n"
>>> "displays a message and makes a dictionary from a tuple"
>>> " of (key, value) pairs. Raises a ValueError exception if"
>>> " any key or value is ExceptMe."
>>> },
>>> {"factorize", discipline_factorize, METH_VARARGS,
>>> "factorize(«n»)\n\n"
>>> "returns a tuple of integer pairs («i», «r»)
>>> representing the"
>>> "prime factors of positive integer «n», where «i» is a
>>> prime"
>>> " number and «r» is the number of times «i» occurs as a
>>> factor"
>>> " of «n». Raises a ValueError exception if any «i» or
>>> «r» equals 5."
>>> },
>>> END_STRUCT_LIST
>>> };
>>>
>>> That lack of a comma means you shouldn’t be adding anything after that
>>> last item.
>
> (Why not? Maybe you do want to add another option. Or you want to remove
> or comment that last one. Same issue with semicolons. Make all lines
> have the same rank.)
>
His point was that "END_STRUCT_LIST" is a sentinel - like the null
character at the end of a C-style string. It marks the end of the list,
so any added options must come /before/ END_STRUCT_LIST.
Back to comp.lang.misc | Previous | Next — Previous in thread | Next in thread | Find similar
Removing influences from a language bart <bc@freeuk.com> - 2025-11-08 16:16 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language Mikko <mikko.levanto@iki.fi> - 2025-11-09 12:30 +0200
Re: Removing influences from a language David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> - 2025-11-09 12:22 +0100
Re: Removing influences from a language "Dmitry A. Kazakov" <mailbox@dmitry-kazakov.de> - 2025-11-09 14:20 +0100
Re: Removing influences from a language bart <bc@freeuk.com> - 2025-11-09 14:09 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> - 2025-11-09 15:40 +0100
Re: Removing influences from a language bart <bc@freeuk.com> - 2025-11-09 15:17 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> - 2025-11-09 17:42 +0100
Re: Removing influences from a language bart <bc@freeuk.com> - 2025-11-09 20:07 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language Tristan Wibberley <tristan.wibberley+netnews2@alumni.manchester.ac.uk> - 2026-02-02 02:32 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language Lawrence D’Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-11-09 23:35 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language bart <bc@freeuk.com> - 2025-11-10 00:56 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language Lawrence D’Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-11-10 01:02 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language bart <bc@freeuk.com> - 2025-11-10 01:12 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language Lawrence D’Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-11-10 03:51 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> - 2025-11-10 09:14 +0100
Re: Removing influences from a language bart <bc@freeuk.com> - 2025-11-10 11:00 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> - 2025-11-10 14:13 +0100
Re: Removing influences from a language bart <bc@freeuk.com> - 2025-11-10 16:20 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> - 2025-11-10 17:33 +0100
Re: Removing influences from a language bart <bc@freeuk.com> - 2025-11-10 21:01 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> - 2025-11-11 12:33 +0100
Re: Removing influences from a language Tristan Wibberley <tristan.wibberley+netnews2@alumni.manchester.ac.uk> - 2026-02-02 03:13 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language Janis Papanagnou <janis_papanagnou+ng@hotmail.com> - 2025-11-11 12:59 +0100
Re: Removing influences from a language bart <bc@freeuk.com> - 2025-11-11 15:08 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language Lawrence D’Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-11-11 20:44 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language bart <bc@freeuk.com> - 2025-11-11 23:16 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language Tristan Wibberley <tristan.wibberley+netnews2@alumni.manchester.ac.uk> - 2026-02-02 03:09 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> - 2026-02-02 11:32 +0100
Re: Removing influences from a language Janis Papanagnou <janis_papanagnou+ng@hotmail.com> - 2026-02-02 16:32 +0100
Re: Removing influences from a language Tristan Wibberley <tristan.wibberley+netnews2@alumni.manchester.ac.uk> - 2026-02-08 15:52 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language Janis Papanagnou <janis_papanagnou+ng@hotmail.com> - 2026-02-08 17:51 +0100
Re: Removing influences from a language Tristan Wibberley <tristan.wibberley+netnews2@alumni.manchester.ac.uk> - 2026-02-09 16:58 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language ram@zedat.fu-berlin.de (Stefan Ram) - 2026-02-09 18:01 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language Tristan Wibberley <tristan.wibberley+netnews2@alumni.manchester.ac.uk> - 2026-02-09 23:44 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language Lawrence D’Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2026-02-10 06:41 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language Tristan Wibberley <tristan.wibberley+netnews2@alumni.manchester.ac.uk> - 2026-02-10 14:40 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language Tristan Wibberley <tristan.wibberley+netnews2@alumni.manchester.ac.uk> - 2026-02-09 23:40 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language Tristan Wibberley <tristan.wibberley+netnews2@alumni.manchester.ac.uk> - 2026-02-05 19:49 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language ram@zedat.fu-berlin.de (Stefan Ram) - 2026-02-06 03:01 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language ram@zedat.fu-berlin.de (Stefan Ram) - 2026-02-11 12:07 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language Lawrence D’Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2026-02-11 22:44 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> - 2026-02-12 16:56 +0100
Re: Removing influences from a language Michael S <already5chosen@yahoo.com> - 2026-02-08 11:01 +0200
Re: Removing influences from a language David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> - 2026-02-08 14:37 +0100
Re: Removing influences from a language Michael S <already5chosen@yahoo.com> - 2026-02-08 15:57 +0200
Re: Removing influences from a language David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> - 2026-02-08 16:34 +0100
Re: Removing influences from a language Tristan Wibberley <tristan.wibberley+netnews2@alumni.manchester.ac.uk> - 2026-02-02 02:39 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language Tristan Wibberley <tristan.wibberley+netnews2@alumni.manchester.ac.uk> - 2026-02-02 02:07 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language Lawrence D’Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> - 2025-11-09 20:59 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language bart <bc@freeuk.com> - 2025-11-13 17:16 +0000
Re: Removing influences from a language bart <bc@freeuk.com> - 2025-11-13 22:39 +0000
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