On Tue, Oct 28, 2014 at 03:55:53PM -0500, Greg Donald wrote:
On Tue, Oct 28, 2014 at 2:04 PM, John de la Garza <john@jjdev.com> wrote:
It seems like you assuming the limit is based on terminal size?
Hmm, I thought it was because of 80 column punch cards and ancient printers that didn't wrap.
What is the difference? It sounds like you think the 80 col suggesetion is based on hardware limitations, that is my point.
There is some research in typography that suggests that it is easier to read text that is not on long lines.
Developers don't actually read most of the code seen, over time our eyes become trained to rapidly scan for patterns. We've invented lots of tools like cscope, ctags, lxr, and grep to further keep us from having to actually read much code at all.
Well, some programmers do actually spend a far amount of time reading code. I simply have to disagree with you on this.
Newspapers have a large sheet of paper but they use short columns.
Yeah, short columns with chaotic white-space. The text fills the column width and is both left and right justified. I doubt anyone does "text-align: justify;" to their code editor.
Who still reads newspapers? The 2 people still using punch cards?
you are missing my point, I am make an example of how some peoples eyes generally work
My display is frequently greater than 80 col. I see this as an opertunity to have two xterms next to each other, not to have lines that are longer.
Do you hear yourself? "Oh, my eyes, my eyes, I can't be bothered to read code so far out to the right, it burns, it burns!" yes, this is basically what I am saying.
Or "I can read two lines of code in two different files from two different contexts, but I cannot be bothered to read one longer line from a single file from a single context. I can multitask all day, but I cannot ever single-task, forget that drama!".
now you are assuming things about the way I work Sometimes I tail a log file while working in another window, but this isn't what we are talking about
All I'm saying is since no one adheres to it religiously, and the fact that I've seen many times maintainers telling people to just ignore it, the 80 character checkpatch warning is pointless. Given that it really comes down to a per-case best effort attempt, just set an 80 column indicator in your editor and try to stay within it, if you can.
you are infering a lot from my original comment. I wasn't saying to stick to it at all costs. I don't split strings because then you may have a hard time grepping for them. If you can't fit your code in 80 columns it is usually a sign you are getting it wrong. I rarely have felt limited by 80 columns.
Keeping the checkpatch 80 character warning around is just academic masturbation.
submit a patch to change it then, if no one cares then it should get merged, I'm betting people do care