Proposal: Adjacent string literal concatenation

[kentor]

This would be great when breaking up strings into multiple lines in the source code. It would save us from writing a + for every line break. This is a feature present in C, Python, and Ruby. It's most useful when your style guide enforces max characters per line and you want to keep a level of indentation.

Example:

// gettext is used for translations
gettext('This is a string literal '
        'written in multiple lines');

should be transpiled to a single string.

// gettext is used for translations
gettext('This is a string literal written in multiple lines');

Other thoughts:

• An indented template string introduces multiple spaces in between words and line feed characters.
• Stripping line feeds and multiple spaces is not entirely the point. Yes we can create a function that does that, but having the interpreter/compiler handle the concatenation should be more performant and the strings can be statically analyzed by tools (linting, makemessages)

[getify]

We already have that:

gettext(`This is a string literal 
        written in multiple lines`);

See: [https://github.com/lukehoban/es6features#template-strings](Template Strings)

[getify]

We already have that:

gettext(`This is a string literal 
        written in multiple lines`);

See: [https://github.com/lukehoban/es6features#template-strings](Template Strings)

[michaelficarra]

Those are not the same thing, @getify. @kentor's proposal would be the same as

// gettext is used for translations
gettext('This is a string literal ' +
        'written in multiple lines');

[michaelficarra]

Those are not the same thing, @getify. @kentor's proposal would be the same as

// gettext is used for translations
gettext('This is a string literal ' +
        'written in multiple lines');

[shovon]

@getify also relevant: http://programmers.stackexchange.com/a/255021/17183

[shovon]

@getify also relevant: http://programmers.stackexchange.com/a/255021/17183

[kentor]

@getify @michaelficarra Right, if I were to indent the block containing the template string, I would add spaces in between literal and written. Also the \n character may not be desired.

I'm running my javascript through django's makemessages for translations, and it looks for strings in between gettext (static analysis I think). If the spaces are introduced it will think the source string has changed. I'm concatenating using + for now to avoid the problem, but it would just be a nice feature not to have to do that.

Also this could perhaps be a performance boost depending on the environment/VM. I definitely see it being transpiled to a single string without using +.

[kentor]

@getify @michaelficarra Right, if I were to indent the block containing the template string, I would add spaces in between literal and written. Also the \n character may not be desired.

I'm running my javascript through django's makemessages for translations, and it looks for strings in between gettext (static analysis I think). If the spaces are introduced it will think the source string has changed. I'm concatenating using + for now to avoid the problem, but it would just be a nice feature not to have to do that.

Also this could perhaps be a performance boost depending on the environment/VM. I definitely see it being transpiled to a single string without using +.

[allenwb]

see https://esdiscuss.org/topic/multiline-template-strings-that-don-t-break-indentation

[allenwb]

see https://esdiscuss.org/topic/multiline-template-strings-that-don-t-break-indentation

[shovon]

Also this could perhaps be a performance boost depending on the environment/VM. I definitely see it being transpiled to a single string without using +.

Yeah, that's definitely a big win.

[shovon]

Also this could perhaps be a performance boost depending on the environment/VM. I definitely see it being transpiled to a single string without using +.

Yeah, that's definitely a big win.

[pluma]

Here's the relevant part of the official Python reference: https://docs.python.org/3.4/reference/lexical_analysis.html#string-and-bytes-literals

Ditto for Ruby: http://ruby-doc.org/core-2.2.0/doc/syntax/literals_rdoc.html#label-Strings

[pluma]

Here's the relevant part of the official Python reference: https://docs.python.org/3.4/reference/lexical_analysis.html#string-and-bytes-literals

Ditto for Ruby: http://ruby-doc.org/core-2.2.0/doc/syntax/literals_rdoc.html#label-Strings

[bterlson]

Closing this now. Proposals should have an identified champion and repository set up where work happens. This is not the place to brainstorm about proposals.

[bterlson]

Closing this now. Proposals should have an identified champion and repository set up where work happens. This is not the place to brainstorm about proposals.