Re:Black: An uncompromising Python code formatter
by jaredklewis on Friday May 25, 2018 @02:03PM
(#17156338)
Definitely not the only one, but I think the trend is toward using formatters.
José Valim, creator of Elixir and general programming whiz, I think perfectly summed why formatters are so great in a talk he gave at Elixir conf.
(I am paraphrasing from memory here so if someone has the source, please chime in.)
The gist: “I started using the formatter
and at first I ran the it on my code and I hated it. It’s taking all my carefully, hand formatted code and messing it up! But then I ran it on OTHER people’s code and I loved it, as the code started to look like the standard format I had gotten used to.”
I think many people don’t start to like formatters until they see what it does to other people’s code. Many people like their own fine tuning, but that’s only half the question. For a big project, most of the code I read will not be my code. I prefer all of that code be in one, consistent style. Sometimes formatting is expressive, so it is a trade off, but for me the lost expressiveness is far outweighed by the Gaines consistency.
José Valim, creator of Elixir and general programming whiz, I think perfectly summed why formatters are so great in a talk he gave at Elixir conf.
(I am paraphrasing from memory here so if someone has the source, please chime in.)
The gist: “I started using the formatter and at first I ran the it on my code and I hated it. It’s taking all my carefully, hand formatted code and messing it up! But then I ran it on OTHER people’s code and I loved it, as the code started to look like the standard format I had gotten used to.”
I think many people don’t start to like formatters until they see what it does to other people’s code. Many people like their own fine tuning, but that’s only half the question. For a big project, most of the code I read will not be my code. I prefer all of that code be in one, consistent style. Sometimes formatting is expressive, so it is a trade off, but for me the lost expressiveness is far outweighed by the Gaines consistency.