[Tutor] usage difference between tabs and spaces

[Alan Gauld]

On 09/09/14 13:27, Mirage Web Studio wrote:

> would like to understand why hitting the poor keyboard 4/8/12 times is
> preferred than just hitting it 1/2/3 times.

Its not, as others have already said, you set the tab
key to insert spaces. Of course you usually have to delete
those spaces manually - but hopefully that's a relatively
rare event - and there are usually short cuts to delete
to start of line.!

But spaces are preferred because they are a fixed size
whereas different editors/browsers display tabs differently.
And a common size is 8 space equivalent - which looks bad
if there are 3 or 4 levels of indentation, and usually
requires more line wrapping.

OTOH 4 spaces is 4 spaces regardless of the viewer used.

-- 
Alan G
Author of the Learn to Program web site
http://www.alan-g.me.uk/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/alangauldphotos