[bug #39943] Add an alternative parsing mode that regards space and tab as identical tokens

[Paul D. Smith]

Follow-up Comment #1, bug #39943 (project make):

IMO _any_ editor which automatically replaces TABs with spaces should never be
considered to be a useful programming tool.  But YMMV of course.

Please see the NEWS file for the current release (GNU make 3.82):


* New special variable: .RECIPEPREFIX allows you to reset the recipe
  introduction character from the default (TAB) to something else.  The
  first character of this variable value is the new recipe introduction
  character.  If the variable is set to the empty string, TAB is used again.
  It can be set and reset at will; recipes will use the value active when
  they were first parsed.  To detect this feature check the value of
  $(.RECIPEPREFIX).


Regarding creating a new mode that allows both TAB characters and space
characters: that would break so many makefiles that I don't believe it would
be used enough to warrant the complications it would introduce.

As for your suggestion regarding the term "hard tab", when I wrote that
message I'd never heard this term.  I'm still not sure why the prefix "hard"
is added; what is being distinguished by this?  A TAB is a TAB, and there's
only one TAB character.  There's no such thing as a "soft tab": I don't really
know what that means.  However, I'm willing to change the message text if
people think it will be significantly clearer.

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