All, Another tip is be succinct, posting only the information necessary to convey the context of the question. Jim -----Original Message----- From: piclist-bounces@mit.edu [mailto:piclist-bounces@mit.edu] On Behalf Of Dwayne Reid Sent: Sunday, September 13, 2009 12:23 PM To: Microcontroller discussion list - Public. Subject: Re: [PIC] PIC code formatting for list At 01:29 AM 9/13/2009, Manu Abraham wrote: >FWIW, Wouldn't it be better, if you instruct the email client to >handle tabs properly, rather than make sure every poster mucks up with >his coding style to something else ? Coding styles can be due to >various reasons. There's even a war on tabs vs spaces. But strictly >speaking it becomes a nightmare with spaces, when you are dealing with >a SCM. I don't know what a "SCM" is. I can tell you that trying to read someone else's code with tabs instead of spaces is a nightmare. Some (like me) have their editor set so that tabs expand to 4 spaces, many (most?) have tabs set to 8 spaces, a few have custom tab stops set to that the number of spaces depends where you are within the line. All of these choices make each particular person more productive in their environment. I do fail to understand why you think that tabs are better than spaces. Please don't take my statement as an invitation to start a discussion on this subject - I suspect this borders on being one of those religious "C" vs "ASM" type discussions. That said: how can tabs be better than spaces when the very definition of a tab stop is variable? Regardless of how you feel about that particular subject, I think the list rules are pretty simple: 1) post in fixed font (plain text) format 2) use spaces instead of tabs 3) comment your code - either in-line or as a block of text above each code section (or both). Use meaningful comments that explain what your intent is. Simple comments such as "move constant to w" on the same line as "movlw xx" are not only useless, they tend to be downright annoying. Most importantly, they hide the intent of the code and thus make it harder to understand. 4) Use blank lines between major blocks so that line-wrap doesn't mess up your formatting. What I mean is this: what you are writing might look great on that nice wide-screen monitor you are viewing. Many email clients and some email handling systems will wrap that text at 78 characters or so. Leaving a blank line between major sections means that each section is still nicely bordered above and below with a blank line. Trust me - it DOES make your post easier to read. Following those simple rules means that more people will take the time to read and perhaps ponder your problem. Hope this helps. dwayne -- Dwayne Reid Trinity Electronics Systems Ltd Edmonton, AB, CANADA (780) 489-3199 voice (780) 487-6397 fax www.trinity-electronics.com Custom Electronics Design and Manufacturing -- http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist -- http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist