On: What if C++ looked more like Python or CoffeeScript?

[porges]

This looks really error-prone to me.

Have you looked at previous attempts, such as SPECS? http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~damian/papers/HTML/ModestProp...

[SupremumLimit → porges]

Any specific reasons why it's error-prone? I've just seen someone post a link to SPECS in the comments to the post - it's interesting but takes a very different direction. I wanted the code to remain recognisably C++.

[kcbanner → porges]

Any python developer will tell you they have accidentally indented or un-indented some code, and that error took hours to find

[3d7718844 → kcbanner]

I've been programming in Python for 4 years and I've never spent hours trying to find an indentation error.

It comes up, sure, but no more frequently than any other syntax error in a different language and there are usually dead giveaways indicating what happened. Most IDEs/editors have options to view whitespace characters, so if you're worried about encountering a bug from this you can always enable that feature.

It's really a non-issue.

[kissgyorgy → 3d7718844]

totally agree with you

[SupremumLimit → kcbanner]

Well I've written quite a bit of CoffeeScript, and while I had a few issues with incorrect code translation to JavaScript, I don't recall ever having problems with mis-indented code.

[pseudonom- → kcbanner]

As another point to triangulate from, Haskell is also whitespace-sensitive and I have never had a non-trivial whitespace error in it.

[Pitarou → kcbanner]

This one won't.