4 ms·
Linus Torvalds disagrees about line lengths for what it's worth: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23356607 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23356607
by okareaman 6y ago
Linus Torvalds disagrees about line lengths for what it's worth: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23356607 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23356607
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- m33k44 6y agoAt one point he use to be fanatic about it. The VIM configuration line specific to linux kernel development originated from that insistance on 80 chars per line in the early days.
- kmonsen 6y agoIt made a lot more sense back then as well.
- rudedogg 6y agoI find it difficult to have meaningful variable/function names and stay under 80 characters. Plus, with code completion (especially in a strongly typed language) it’s no longer necessary to optimize for fewer keystrokes.
- smoe 6y agoI do think having lines around 80 characters makes it more fluent to read code. It is not about saving keystrokes or to be able to do split screen even on smaller screens. But what has worked better for me is to have it as a soft not a hard rule. Better to have some lines go over a bit than having awkward breaks that make it harder to read
- qayxc 6y agoThe main problem is that code isn't like other text. Strict rules are BS because they count characters that don't contribute to the actual content that you're parsing. This includes punctuation and especially whitespace. I tend to keep lines short in general, too, but strict limits just for the sake of it are indeed more hinderance that helpful.
- cryptonector 6y agoCount me in. I'm pretty tired of 80 (79) column limits.
- nemoniac 6y agoInterestingly the text (not code) of Torvalds' posting discussed there is formatted at 70 characters wide.