Case sensitivity, line labels and the future

On Tue, 15 Apr 2003, Jay Belanger wrote:

> 
> Martin RUBEY <rubey@labri.fr> writes:
> 
> > (2) Case sensitivity and line labels: I think that user's choice is a good
> > thing, and in my opinion there is a very simple way to achieve it:
> >
> > All contributed stuff must be case insensitive and must not use line 
> > labels in order to be accepted. In fact this is very easy to check: when 
> > receiving the source, demand that it's all in lower case...
> 
> I don't understand the point.  Why not just make the contributed
> stuff lower-case, why is case sensitivity an issue?
> Unless making the conversion from case-insensitive to case-sensitive
> is a large time sink, what is the problem with case sensitivity?  
> What problems does it cause?  (I usually type foo, but occasionally
> I like to type Foo?)

As soon as we have case-sensitive packages, it will be impossible to use
them in case-INsensitive maxima. So as long as maxima is possibly
case-insensitive (as it is now or as it might be in the future by choice), 
such a package might be broken. (because it might contain two different 
variables Foo and foo, which would be the same in case-insensitive maxima)

If we demand that all contributed packages are in lower case, there cannot 
be a problem.

Of course, if we go for straight case-sensitivity (no choice), then 
we do not need this requirement. I vote for users choice, because I think 
that the above requirement is very easy to adhere to. (and we need 
requirements anyway, otherwise stuff will never be maintainable by other 
people than the original author)

Martin