Style guide to writing code for the LeftParen project:

Style guide to writing code for the LeftParen project:
======================================================

* No line can be longer than 90 chars wide (occasionally, exceptions are allowed when it's
  a long string or something like that.

* Comments at the beginning of a line need to use two semicolons.  Comments that appear
  at the end of a line use one.  E.g.,

  ;; use two semicolons for this case
  (define x (cool beans)) ; and one for this

* For important, non-helper functions, you optionally may consider a "header comment".
  The idea is that you visially offset the function as being important, and potentially
  provide an explanation as to its use.  For example,

  ;;
  ;; my-great-fn
  ;; 
  (define (my-great-fn x)
    (* x x))

  If you want to comment on that function you would do this (taking care to allways leave
  a blank comment line at the top and the bottom:
  
  ;;
  ;; my-great-fn
  ;; 
  ;; Hello there.  Isn't this a great fn?  It looks a lot like the square function, but
  ;; I promise you it's not.
  ;; 
  (define (my-great-fn x)
    (* x x))

* All variable names should use standard-scheme-casing.  All "settings" variables should
  use *EASY_TO_WRITE_WHILE_HOLDING_DOWN_SHIFT_CASING_WITH_ASTERISKS_AT_THE_ENDS*.

* Going forward, we want to use .ss as the extension for all Scheme files.  This 
  apparently plays nicer with the PLT module system.

* Don't use [ or ].  Just use ( and ) all the time.

* If you ever need to "require" another planet library, use the "=" syntax for the minor
  mode version.  This locks in that version so that if someone is using LeftParen in, say,
  production, they don't get automatically upgraded.  E.g.,
  
  (planet "foo.ss" ("somebody" "baz.plt" 2 (= 1)))  or
  (planet somebody/baz:2:=1/foo)