[gentoo-dev] Ebuild indentation (tabs vs. spaces) fascism ;^)

[Arcady Genkin]

Two questions:

1. What makes tabbed indentation in ebuilds so much better than
   indentation with spaces?  I know *plenty* of reasons *against* using
   tab characters, but I must be missing something obvious, because I
   know no reasons in favor of tabs.

2. Even if it turns out tabs are somehow better than spaces, why do
   we want to be so fascist[1][2] about it?  Why don't we let the ebuild
   maintainer to decide which approach suits his philosophy, editor and
   habits?  We can still require that all indents are 4 spaces wide; I'm
   only talking about tabs/spaces issue.

Footnotes: 
[1]  Talking about bulk force-tabbifying ebuilds.
[2]  Please note the smiley in the subject line before you stone me
     for my choice of words.
-- 
Arcady Genkin