[AccessD] Delimiter Value (was: Automatic Update Function)

Tue Mar 3 10:47:29 CST 2015

This is an interesting thread but I do have one question, which derives
from personal experience writing a code generator that had to find markers
in templates and substitute either literal or iterated text in place of
said markers.

I opted for two-character delimiters ; they could have been pretty much any
given character expressed twice. As it happens, I opted for "\\marker\\",
which admittedly could have created problems when attempting to express
UNCs etc., but I escaped these in the standard way.

As previously pointed out, the use of the cent-sign may not be universal,
and that is a problem.

But my larger question is this: why are you restricting delimiters to
single-character markers? That seems to me to be the path to trouble no
matter which native (human or typographical) language you are using.
Ultimately, this problem resolves to the likelihood of any given marker
being used within the text of interest; and so we have to go for the
unlikeliest combinations, the smallest unit being one character, but I am
arguing in favor of two-character delimiters, while also providing for the
standard escape-clause syntax of repeating the delimiter twice if you mean
it not as a delimiter but part of the text.

I've just Googled "the number of official languages in the world", and
India and China come out way on top, with a few hundred in each nation.
Just to make this much more painfully clear, "language" is distinguished
from "dialect", which is to say that even though I have lived almost my
life in English-speaking Canada, I can also recognize Cicero-English from
New Orleans English from Oxford English, and also readily discern Quebec
francais from Parisian and even Marseilles. I'm shakier on Dutch, but I can
discern Mandarin from Cantonese in fewer than 5 seconds, and also
Shanghaiese from both of these. You might conjecture that I have an ear for
language; perhaps that is true. After all, I can convincingly pronounce two
of the  trickiest words in Dutch, but that's because I've visited
Nederlands about six times, and picked up a little more on each visit. The
two most difficult words in Dutch are the word for vacuum cleaner (stofzuiger)
and the name of a town on the coast whose name was used in WWII to
distinguish Nazi spys from legitimate Dutch citizens (Schlevningen). It
required more practice for me to get these two words than to apprehend and
duplicate the tones in Cantonese; but I got there, eventually.

Sorry for the extensive sidetrack. I just wanted to emphasize that
single-character delimiters are bound to cause trouble in a large number of
languages in the world. Facing this ugly fact, the developer has a couple
of choices: narrow the translation-geography to a few well-chosen languages
of immediate interest to the app of interest, or strive for a broader
translation-strategy; in my opinion the only viable path to the latter
approach is to expand the concept of a delimiter beyond single-character
representation, and in addition to provide the standard escape-syntax (e.g.
in py preferred choice, "\\" is the delimiter, except when repeated, in
which case the second occurrence is to be interpreted as literal text).

This syntax and notation, I hope, will sidestep the fact that the "cents"
sign will not be misinterpreted by non-English (and in fact
non-Western-European) keyboards.

Arthur

On Tue, Mar 3, 2015 at 11:06 AM, Gustav Brock <gustav at cactus.dk> wrote:

> Hi Tina
>
> That character could be: ¤
> I've seen on every keyboard but never seen it used for anything.
>
> However, I've never had issues with the "|" pipe sign, so why make things
> more strange than necessary.
>
> /gustav
>
> -----Oprindelig meddelelse-----
> Fra: accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com [mailto:
> accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com] På vegne af Tina Norris Fields
> Sendt: 3. marts 2015 17:02
> Til: Access Developers discussion and problem solving
> Emne: Re: [AccessD] Delimiter Value (was: Automatic Update Function)
>
> This is an intriguing part of the discussion.  One perspective is to find
> a symbol that will not accidentally be typed because it's not on a standard
> keyboard.  The other perspective is to find a symbol that can easily be
> used (because it is on a standard keyboard), but is not commonly used for
> most typing and coding.  Fascinating.  I like the pipe symbol because it
> fits with the second perspective.  I would like an
> ALT+ASCII code symbol that is easy to remember and doesn't appear on a
> standard keyboard, too, because it reduces the threat of accidental
> typing.  Hmmm - pondering.
> TNF
>
> Tina Norris Fields
> tinanfields-at-torchlake-dot-com
> 231-322-2787
>
> On 3/3/2015 8:13 AM, Jim Dettman wrote:
> >
> >   I'm not sure if it's as true today as it once was, but using
> > anything beyond 127 was iffy.
> >
> >   The extended characters have no set definition unlike those below
> > 128.  So while that may not exist as a character on a US keyboard, it
> > may exist on others because it might not be a cent symbol.
> >
> >   I use the vertical pipe as well because to my knowledge, there's no
> > place where one would use it outside of computer commands and it is
> > easy to read because the character is thin.
> >
> > Jim.
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com
> > [mailto:accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com] On Behalf Of Dan Waters
> > Sent: Monday, March 02, 2015 08:59 PM
> > To: 'Access Developers discussion and problem solving'
> > Subject: Re: [AccessD] Delimiter Value (was: Automatic Update
> > Function)
> >
> > Hi John,
> >
> > A pretty safe delimiter is a ¢ symbol (cent symbol).  To use it,
> > you'll have to find it somewhere and copy it into your code.  Or, you
> > can could also use Chr(162).
> >
> > I don't think a cent symbol is on any US electronic keyboards, and
> > certainly not on any others.
> >
> > I found a good list of Chr values at
> > http://www.gtwiki.org/mwiki/?title=VB_Chr_Values.
> >
> > Dan
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com
> > [mailto:accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com] On Behalf Of John W.
> > Colby
> > Sent: Monday, March 02, 2015 15:32 PM
> > To: Access Developers discussion and problem solving
> > Subject: Re: [AccessD] Automatic Update Function
> >
> > Of course it was simple.  However if you look at SQL Server export for
> > example, by default if you tell it to use quotes, it quotes EVERY FIELD.
> >
> > So if you are getting data from the wild, look out.  If you are doing
> > the export yourself, and then the import yourself, it is really fairly
> > easy, you control both ends.
> >
> > As I mentioned I like pipe delimited because (in MY data) pipes are
> > unheard of, so using that as a delimiter is pretty safe.  My data is
> > name / address from the wild, so tabs are encountered occasionally. I
> > have never actually seen a pipe coming in from raw data, though of
> > course it is a key on the keyboard and someone could accidentally hit it.
> >
> > John W. Colby
>
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-- 
Arthur