1) it is impossible to explain the precise workings of the rule to a class of first years undergraduates
Try "Python copied the offside rule from Haskell, so it must be cool." (*) http://docs.python.org/ref/indentation.html Which is true only "morally", e. g. it says here http://www.python.org/doc/faq/general.html#what-is-python that the indentation idea comes from a language ABC: http://homepages.cwi.nl/~steven/abc/ Where does Haskell's rule come come from? (*) Of course the typical undergrad is a part-time web developer, using Zope, and he thinks that Python is cool because it has no static typing, so that programming is "much easier" than at university where they teach him Haskell. But he soon finds that he can leave out all Haskell type signatures as well, so he thinks that Haskell is going in the right direction... -- -- Johannes Waldmann -- Tel/Fax (0341) 3076 6479/80 -- ---- http://www.imn.htwk-leipzig.de/~waldmann/ -------