Re: Form feeds in source code

[Daniel Herring]

While I sympathise with the request to leave them be, most editors do not 
support jumping by ff-marked pages and emacs has other ways to jump to 
function definitions.

If this use of the form feed ever regains widespread use, I suspect it 
would come in the form of a new Unicode character.

- Daniel


On Fri, 18 Sep 2020, Pete Dietl wrote:

> I think keeping them in for the sake of one editor is not a good reason. I 
> think they make the code look messy and dated, personally.
>
> On Fri, Sep 18, 2020 at 11:24 AM Edward Welbourne <edward.welbourne@qt.io> 
> wrote:
>       On Fri, 2020-09-18 at 10:59 -0500, Pete Dietl wrote:
>
>       >> Why are there so many form feeds in the source?
>
>
>
>       Paul Smith (18 September 2020 18:12) replied:
>
>       > That was the style that Roland used when the code was written: form
>
>       > feeds were used inside a source file to separate major functions.
>
>       >
>
>       > I guess it hails from a time when it wasn't that unusual to print out
>
>       > your code to physical paper, on a printer, and read it that way.  Then
>
>       > it would be nice to have a major function start at the top of the
>
>       > page.
>
>
>
>       In emacs, at least, the editor provides easy commands to jump to the
>
>       start or end of the present "page" - i.e. the last or next form-feed -
>
>       and this can be a great convenience for moving through a file, jumping
>
>       to the start of a *logical* page, rather than paging down by whatever
>
>       screen-full your present screen-size gives you.  I, for one, find such
>
>       markers useful in emacs.
>
>
>
>       They are harmless, let them be !
>
>
>
>               Eddy.