Subject: Case sensitivity, line labels and the future
From: Felix E. Klee
Date: Tue, 15 Apr 2003 16:35:05 +0200
On Tuesday 15 April 2003 16:19, Martin RUBEY wrote:
> > Having contributed packages be in lower case might be a good compromise
> > between the two camps. However, I disagree that such packages will break
> > things. When we start using Unicode characters, then in a case
> > insensitive environment "Foo" could be printed as e.g. "%0046oo" or
> > something similar. Sticking to such a convention is much easier than
> > inventing out own convention like "F_capitaloo".
>
> I agree partially: %0046oo is better than F_capitaloo. But having
> package contributers contribute in lower case only, is best. I don't want
> to be obliged to use some special frontend in order to read somebody's
> package!
As I wrote in my original post, I *agree* that having core packages in lower
case might be a good compromise.
I just object the idea of handling and storing all data in lower case. Maxima
should handle Unicode by default. This will make it much more accessible to
people in non english environments. However, e.g. in the command line
interface the user should have an option (maybe as a command line switch) to
work in a case insensitive environment. In such an environment Unicode
characters are displayed and can be entered as %XXXX. And when such a user
doesn't use exotic 3rd party packages he doesn't even need to bother with
Unicode because everything is in lowercase anyways.
Felix