"""Assume you've never programmed before. Would you want to debug a program that has a significant whitespace bug? It's much easier for the average person to spot an unbalanced parenthesis that an incorrectly sized whitespace."""
I'd argue that for a beginner it's equally difficult.
And how about this equally difficult to spot classic bug:
if (f==x)
do_something()
and_also_do_this() //oops!
a language with significant whitespace does not permit it. It gets people using the correct indentation levels from the start, whay they should have used anyway in any language, even one where whitespace doesn't matter.
I propose we don't talk about languages with "significant whitespace", but instead about "languages with proper indentation enforced".
> I propose we don't talk about languages with "significant whitespace", but instead about "languages with proper indentation enforced".
Yes, 'significant whitespace' is too sweeping a term to be useful. I've heard people complain about Python's 'significant whitespace' until they realize that it uses basically the exact same whitespace rules as Java does, except with sensible indentation rules instead of braces.
Why is this hard to catch? Format your code and the incorrect indentation goes away. A beginner should be taught to run the formatter to keep the code neat.
I'd argue that for a beginner it's equally difficult.
And how about this equally difficult to spot classic bug:
if (f==x)
a language with significant whitespace does not permit it. It gets people using the correct indentation levels from the start, whay they should have used anyway in any language, even one where whitespace doesn't matter.I propose we don't talk about languages with "significant whitespace", but instead about "languages with proper indentation enforced".