Language change and code breaks

[Bjorn Pettersen]

> From: Guido van Rossum [mailto:guido at digicool.com]
> 
> > TRuE, tHe ExPRESsiVity oF ThE lANGuaGE is ProBAbLY nOt cRipPled,
> > hOWEvEr, tHere ARe SigNIficantLy FeweR ideNtIFIeRs 
> AVaILABlE whICh mEAns
> > iT is LESs eXPRessIvE. IN pArTicULar, cOMmON Idioms liKE 
> naMiNg CLASseS
> > stArTiNg WiTh UppER cASE lETtERS, AND instaNCeS OF THose cLAsSes
> > begINNiNG with A lOwER caSE LettER CaN NO LongeR Be usED.
> 
> Very funny (not).  You misunderstood the intention.  The programming
> environment should be case-preserving, and automatically correct
> identifiers to use the same case as used when they were defined.

I'm not sure I understand what this means. Are you proposing a
"non-programmer" IDE that automatically corrects incorrectly cased
identifiers and keywords, or are you still suggesting that the language
itself be case insensitive, but with a "non-programmer" IDE that just
makes code look consistent?

I don't think anyone would be opposed to an auto-correcting IDE.

> > AS fAR aS thE Size Of thE VARious camPs, I haVE YeT tO sEe 
> a coMPeLLinG
> > aRGuMeNt thAT THE grOup of noN-pRoGRaMmeRS THat WILl taKe up
> > pRoGRAmmInG, ANd wiLL DO sO in PYTHon InsTEad oF VisUal 
> BasiC, Is any
> > LARGeR Than The groUp of ProgRAmmERs.
> 
> With your atttude, it will never happen.

What attitude is that? The one where I'd rather write new programs than
making sure the tens of thousand lines of Python I've allready written
work with a case insensitive interpreter? I don't think I'm the only one
with that attitude... :-)

-- bjorn