Talk:Unicode variable names
Why!
I just saw this edit and wondered ...? --Paddy3118 07:23, 1 July 2011 (UTC)
- Yeah, that is not good at all. It means that the source code needs conversion to be usable on ascii based platforms. Maybe we will need a unidecoder for such sources. That is probably a future task. Markhobley 20:57, 6 July 2011 (UTC)
- The change was made to Perl 6 code, and it is my understanding that that's correct code for that language. Usage of Unicode glyphs in Perl 6 code is pretty normal. --Michael Mol 21:58, 6 July 2011 (UTC)
- I'm not saying that it is incorrect. However, I do not think that it is a good idea to use non ascii characters in source code, because this will not look good on some terminals, and printed listings may have wrong glyphs or these characters may be omitted completely from the printout. The older version of the code was better IMHO. Markhobley 22:19, 6 July 2011 (UTC)
- All Perl 6 compilers are required to understand Unicode. It might mean that the code isn't editable in ASCII-only editors... but we don't intend to tie ourselves to ancient editors. --Pmichaud 22:05, 6 July 2011 (UTC)
- Some ancient editors are excellent. Why would you not want to be able to edit the code in these? Markhobley 22:21, 6 July 2011 (UTC)
- The change was made to Perl 6 code, and it is my understanding that that's correct code for that language. Usage of Unicode glyphs in Perl 6 code is pretty normal. --Michael Mol 21:58, 6 July 2011 (UTC)
- All this stick-in-the-muddery is kinda beside the point; we'll all have to get used to the future sooner or later. To answer the question behind the question, Perl 6 emphasizes use of Unicode where it enhances readability with traditional (and I don't mean ASCII) symbols. It's arguable whether this helps a great deal with variable names (I think it does in this case), but certainly for operator names it turns what is normally evil, overloading existing operator names, into something that can instead clarify by adding new operator names where the need for visual distinction converges with traditional notations to make that possible. Of course it can be abused, but that's never been a valid argument in Perl culture. Rules that prevent you from writing ugly code also tend to prevent you from writing beautiful code. --TimToady 22:25, 6 July 2011 (UTC)