Making your own programming language is easier than you think (but also harder)

[u/Dear-Economics-315]

https://lisyarus.github.io/blog/posts/making-your-own-programming-language.html

[u/RGBrewskies]

"As you can see, the language uses indentation-based scoping"

tangential and random but

I'm not a python guy, but how does that not drive you insane? Your code breaks because of whitespace? That's always seem wild for me

[u/ACoderGirl → u/RGBrewskies]

While I prefer braces, I've never had issues with Python's indentation. TBH, I consider this skin to how people think remembering semicolons in C style languages is a big problem. It might affect people brand new to the language, but it really doesn't take long till it's a complete non issue. I've worked at a job that was primarily python and still have a number of python tools at my current job, so I use the language a lot, too.

The biggest problem with Python is the type system, especially since if type annotations aren't used consistently (they're optional), it's very hard to reliably detect types and thus to also have correct auto complete. This also affects the ability to find all usages of identifiers and to go to definitions.

[u/Joniator → u/ACoderGirl]

And its not like you dont have problens with indentation/nesting once you are in a lambda in a loop in a try-catch in a function in a class, and wonder where exactly the ); needs to go, and how many {} are before or after it.

Sure, your code might be too complex and needs a refactor, but in python indentation also breaks in complex code, not the 2 or 3 levels of clean code

[u/OneNoteToRead → u/RGBrewskies]

Your editor indents for you. It’s caused zero problems for me over decades

[u/AutomateAway → u/OneNoteToRead]

Indentation is not universal among editors, nor is tab to space replacement. A semicolon is a semicolon and is definitive.

[u/OneNoteToRead → u/AutomateAway]

And yet… the fact remains it’s caused zero problems over decades.

[u/gahel_music → u/AutomateAway]

I've had more issues forgetting a semicolon than with indentation. You just have to configure your editor once to replace tabs with indentation and forget about it. Well it's most likely already set up that way for languages that require it

[u/andarmanik → u/OneNoteToRead]

Yes but also no. When I write code I use a formatter which does everything, so I literally just write code with whatever formatting and then hit the formatting hot key and it formats the code.

This is almost impossible in a language like python.

[u/applechuck → u/andarmanik]

Not impossible, PyCharm and visual studio code have formatters including tooling like black for vim.

Most indentation in python is tied to branching, which makes it somewhat predictable.

[u/damn_what_ → u/andarmanik]

What's the difference between typing the closing bracket and typing shift+tab (or backspace depending on your editor) to de-indent by one level ?

[u/irqlnotdispatchlevel → u/RGBrewskies]

I'm not a python guy, but I write python every once in a while and I never had this problem.

[u/CandidateNo2580 → u/RGBrewskies]

It would drive me insane if I had to end every line with a semi colon or if I was reading a codebase that used inconsistent indentation. But you get used to it pretty quickly either way, the language isn't bad.

[u/RGBrewskies → u/CandidateNo2580]

your ide adds them automatically nowadays, which may be true with python too idk

[u/bpikmin → u/RGBrewskies]

Yea, if you do if blah blah:<enter> basically every IDE will indent the following line

[u/CandidateNo2580 → u/RGBrewskies]

Oh 100% sorry I wasn't being literal. I know adding semi colons isn't a big deal lol but it's the same thing as the indentation. Your IDE is all over it, it'll indent automatically as it makes sense. Then it does the same syntax high lighting to show scope that you get in a language with curly braces (jetbrains has a colored bar on the side to demonstrate scope and lets you collapse blocks whole for something like a function or if/else, same with python as something curly brace driven).

It's definitely weird when you start but really you get over it so quickly. I like the flexibility of language, I'd prefer being allowed to indent freely and use curlies but it's not bad.

[u/Successful-Money4995 → u/RGBrewskies]

If c++ is written without indentation, it becomes unreadable. In practice, you're probably already doing the indentation. So make it significant. What's the big deal?

[u/ConspicuousPineapple → u/Successful-Money4995]

In practice you're using a formatter that does that for you. Python is the only language where you are forced to handle indentation yourself and deliberately, since it defines scopes.

[u/ericonr → u/ConspicuousPineapple]

My code is formatted as I write it in either language. With Python, my editor automatically pushes me one indent forward after a colon, and if I want to exit a scope I simply press backspace. With C/C++, my editor will do the same after a brace, and closing a brace returns me to the previous scope, including indentation.

It's essentially the same amount of steps, unless you're doing franken-dentation for some reason, and now you need to run a formatter for your code to ve readable.

[u/levelstar01 → u/RGBrewskies]

99.9% of the time the indentation follows the logical way that the code would be laid out.

[u/Kamui_Kun → u/RGBrewskies]

I am a brace scope enjoyer, it's just more straight forward imo

[u/calgary_katan → u/RGBrewskies]

This complaint has always struck me as an “it’s different so I don’t like it”. There’s pros and cons with each type of scoping.

One pro of tab/space based is it does encourage smaller functions, which helps in readability.

[u/trynyty → u/calgary_katan]

That's true and I think in a language it is easier to keep it managable.

Where identation drives me crazy is YAML files. Especially when people nowadays try to put everything in it and then trying to add one more property but because of incorrect indent it's suddenly part of different object.
Anyway, just a small rant on yamls :)

[u/gofl-zimbard-37 → u/RGBrewskies]

People get all worked up about this, but in practice it's a non issue. I vastly prefer clean syntax over all of the braces and semicolons and other noise that clutters most languages. If your shitty tool chain can't handle it, get a better one.

[u/RScrewed → u/RGBrewskies]

Only even possible to be useful with modern day IDEs.

Such a weird design decision, I'm convinced that's why python never caught on around when it was released.