Re: [Nano-devel] [PATCH] cutting: when deleting whole words, don't join lines unexpectedly

[Benno Schulenberg]

Op 11-09-18 om 02:51 schreef David Ramsey:
> Whether it's good that trailing space isn't eaten would depend on the
> circumstances, and I'd prefer to err on the side of consistency, since
> it's reasonable to expect cut-word to work the same way in both
> directions whenever possible.

In principle, yes.  But trailing whitespace and leading whitespace do
not have the same meaning.  Trailing whitespace is either an accident,
in which case there is no problem to confront the user with his or her
sloppiness, or it is there on purpose, like in a flowed-format email.
When it is there on purpose, then it should not be deleted by a word-
eating keystroke.  But leading whitespace... is not there to indicate
continuation nor to separate a word from a preceding one (the newline
already does that).  Leading whitespace is there to give a line or a
block of text some extra visibility.  Conceptually, the left margin is
where the text starts -- there _is_ no whitespace.  The indentation is
just a visual gimmick, it has no meaning for the text.

In short: not all whitespace is created equal.  Thus I see no problem
in treating leading and trailing whitespace differently.  (Whether the
current way is the best way is another matter, though.)

Benno

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