Re: [PATCH] pretty-formats.txt: fix whitespace

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Sep 26, 2023, 16:42 UTC
Message-ID: <xmqqo7hoophh.fsf@gitster.g>
In-Reply-To: <CACZqfqCfvWASMPMxRpRuAUQPcprcB4RHxxke_qTZ3bFGLf3T8Q@mail.gmail.com>

Josh Soref <jsoref@gmail.com> writes:

> As it (IMO) takes effort (admittedly trivial, and quite likely
> habitual) to insert a second space, I assume that this was a desired
> thing and the one space was the aberration, hence the patch went in
> favor of two spaces.

Back in typewriter days, people were taught to leave two spaces after a full stop, because on monospace output it was easier to read that way. Then the desktop publishing software came and people were encouraged to leave the appearance up to the software.

So to old timers who have already been trained to type two spaces after a sentence, it takes more effort not to type the space bar twice.

But as I said already, I personally feel that the consistency guidelines around this area should be:

 (1) it would be nice if a new document does not use mixed style, but

 (2) it is not worth the patch noise only to "fix" them one way or
     the other.

Here "patch noise" does not primarily mean the effort a producer of such a patch spends making sure what they did is correct. The cost of making sure unrelated mistakes do not slip into the codebase and documentation without being noticed is much higher for such a patch that ought to be a mechanical conversion.

Thanks.