Semicolons: mostly unnecessary?

Nick Sabalausky a at a.a
Fri Oct 23 13:07:42 PDT 2009


"Walter Bright" <newshound1 at digitalmars.com> wrote in message 
news:hbt1sv$1650$1 at digitalmars.com...
> Max Samukha wrote:
>> On Thu, 22 Oct 2009 23:21:25 +0200, bambo <ba at m.bo> wrote:
>>
>>> Walter Bright schrieb:
>>>> Adam D. Ruppe wrote:
>>>>
>>>> mostcertainly
>>>> doesNOTmeanalanguageisnecessarilyeasiertoparseSymbolsgiveus
>>>> aparsinganchorperiodsinasentencearentstrictlynecessarywecould
>>>> putoneperlineorjustfigureoutwheretheybelongbyparsingthecontext
>>>> Butthatsfairlyobviouslymuchharderthanusingperiodstofollowwhere
>>>> youareSemicolonsarethesamething
>>>>
>>>> (Fixed that for you!)
>>> Walter, what a remarkable proove the semicolon helps us all a lot!
>>> You are sooooo BRIGHT! You are so creative and intelligent!
>>>
>>> I LOVE YOU!
>>
>> This is one of Walter's proofs that don't prove anything. Spaces
>> between words are *not redundant*.
>
> Armed with a dictionary, there's really only one parse of the above text 
> that works. Consider also that when text is encrypted using pre-computer 
> methods, the first thing done is all spaces are removed and it is put in 
> monocase (because that makes it harder for cryptanalysis). Human 
> decryptors put them back in.
>
> Consider the fragment:
>
>     Ifthepointisntplainobviousfromtheabovefewersymbols
>
> Where else could the spaces possibly go?

There's only one possible way:

Ift hep oint is NT, pla I nob VI O' U.S. Fromt he, a bovef. Ew! Ers y m 
bols!

It's obviously a note from a crazy person.





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