String length 13 characters made of blank spaces

String length 13 characters made of blank spaces

[Christopher Dimech]

Can one do the following to have a string length 13 characters
made of blank spaces, or is it better to use some other construct?

(make-string 13 ? )

Re: String length 13 characters made of blank spaces

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Christopher Dimech wrote:

> Can one do the following to have a string length 13 characters made
> of blank spaces, or is it better to use some other construct?
>
> (make-string 13 ? )

Ask Mats Sundin. I think it's only an unlucky number if you are
a goalie.

-- 
underground experts united
http://user.it.uu.se/~embe8573
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: String length 13 characters made of blank spaces

[Joost Kremers]

On Fri, Oct 30 2020, Christopher Dimech wrote:
> Can one do the following to have a string length 13 characters
> made of blank spaces, or is it better to use some other construct?
>
> (make-string 13 ? )

A space character can also be represented as `?\s`, which is better because the
space after the question mark can easily be overlooked. (See (info "(elisp)
Basic Char Syntax") for details.)

Other than that, though, `make-string` is the right function for the job, I'd
say.

-- 
Joost Kremers
Life has its moments

Re: String length 13 characters made of blank spaces

[tomas]

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On Fri, Oct 30, 2020 at 09:05:32AM +0100, Joost Kremers wrote:
> 
> On Fri, Oct 30 2020, Christopher Dimech wrote:
> > Can one do the following to have a string length 13 characters
> > made of blank spaces, or is it better to use some other construct?
> >
> > (make-string 13 ? )
> 
> A space character can also be represented as `?\s` [...]

D'oh, yes. Much better, thanks.

Cheers
 - t

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Re: String length 13 characters made of blank spaces

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Joost Kremers wrote:

> A space character can also be represented as `?\s`, which is better
> because the space after the question mark can easily be overlooked.

Didn't know that, thanks. Yes, that looks better.

-- 
underground experts united
http://user.it.uu.se/~embe8573
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: String length 13 characters made of blank spaces

[tomas]

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On Fri, Oct 30, 2020 at 04:53:37AM +0100, Christopher Dimech wrote:
> 
> Can one do the following to have a string length 13 characters
> made of blank spaces, or is it better to use some other construct?
> 
> (make-string 13 ? )

That's perfectly fine. For that one character, it is customary
to escape it (i.e. to spell it out as "?\ ". For one, that makes
the space more visible, and then, you need the escape in the
cases where the character has a special meaning (try making a
string of thirteen open parentheses, for example).

Since the escape works always, you get a more consistent (and
arguably, readable) result by always putting a "\" there, i.e.
?\a instead of the equivalent ?a.

But just a matter of taste. In the case of space, since it's
nearly invisible, could send your readers into a tailspin.

Cheers
 - t

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