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I wonder how much of that is older programmers being used to not having highlighting, and how much is younger programmers having never tried programming without

I wonder how much of that is older programmers being used to not having highlighting, and how much is younger programmers having never tried programming without it. I think the default assumption is that it is all old people resisting change (hence the 80 columns amber terminals bit), but I'm a younger anti-highlighting example. I am not old, I learned to code with coloured syntax highlighting. I didn't realize how much of a hindrance it is until after I had been programming for years and tried turning it off.

waterlesscloud 14y ago
I'm old enough to have done both, and it doesn't matter much to me one way or the other. If anything, I think coloring is slightly helpful, but I'm fine without it.
seanmcdirmid 14y ago
Sometimes paradigm shifts are just that and indicate generational pivots. Ask an electrician today to do some wiring without color coded wires and they'll think you are batsh*t crazy, but it probably wouldn't have been so crazy a hundred or so years ago when color wasn't viable. The same thing applies to code; these people grew up programming before color monitors were much of an option.