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From: eugene@eos.UUCP (Eugene Miya)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.fortran,comp.lang.misc,comp.arch
Subject: Message from God (Fortran history question answered) sig blanks
Message-ID: <5974@eos.UUCP>
Date: 12 Jan 90 23:42:28 GMT
Reply-To: eugene@eos.UUCP (Eugene Miya)
Followup-To: comp.lang.fortran
Organization: NASA Ames Research Center, Calif.
Lines: 15

I forgot which newsgroup asked this.

From: John Backus <backus@almvma>
To: Eugene Miya <eugene@eos.arc.nasa.gov>
Subject: Re: another fortran history question
In-Reply-To: Your message of Fri, 15 Dec 89 14:52:35 PST,
             <8912152252.AA10825@eos.arc.nasa.gov>

Eugene,
We made one or more blanks equivalent to one blank because we felt
this would allow a user to arrange his program more meaningfully;
also, we felt that it was often hard for keypunchers to tell whether
there was one or two blanks in some circumstances. Hope this clears
up this vital question! (And I hope I'm remembering correctly!)
--John