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In The Beginning (tm) source code was very explicitly a 2D grid, with column numbers being lexically significant in both FORTRAN and COBOL because columns matte
by Sharlin 8y ago
In The Beginning (tm) source code was very explicitly a 2D grid, with column numbers being lexically significant in both FORTRAN and COBOL because columns matter in punch card representation.
Of course, as every Lisp programmer knows, programs represented in almost any high-level language are actually trees, and to force them into a 2D grid of symbols is rather unnatural and awkward. Specifically, almost all 2D grids of symbols are lexically or syntactically invalid programs, and many natural source code transformations require either manual labor or special support from the editor.