# Famous computer scientists using proportional fonts to program (Rob Pike & Bjarne Stroustrup use Lucida Grande) (2024-01-13)

**URL:** <https://pluralist.net/t/famous-computer-scientists-using-proportional-fonts-to-program-rob-pike-bjarne-stroustrup-use-lucida-grande-2024-01-13/39>\
**Category:** breadcrumbs\
**Created:** [January 13, 2024, 8:00am UTC](https://pluralist.net/t/famous-computer-scientists-using-proportional-fonts-to-program-rob-pike-bjarne-stroustrup-use-lucida-grande-2024-01-13/39 "2024-01-13T08:00:00Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![delyan](https://pluralist.net/user_avatar/pluralist.net/delyan/32/245_2.png) [@delyan](https://pluralist.net/u/delyan)\
**Post date:** [January 13, 2024, 8:00am UTC](https://pluralist.net/t/famous-computer-scientists-using-proportional-fonts-to-program-rob-pike-bjarne-stroustrup-use-lucida-grande-2024-01-13/39/1 "2024-01-13T08:00:00Z")

</div>

Today I learned that “Bjarne uses Rob Pike’s [Sam text editor](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sam_(text_editor)), which by default uses a proportional font (_Lucida_).” This comes from a [comment on Hacker News](https://news.y%5Bcombinator.com/item?id=11719325), so unclear how confident we can be in this statement.

On the other hand Rob Pike himself tweeted (tweet now deleted) that he programs Go with Lucida Grande.

 ![image](https://pluralist.net/uploads/default/original/1X/dfaa8539a62f0d145bc25c551ccb5593d32d69db.png)

I have been exploring (and rewriting) retro text editors as of late, so learning about [Bjarne Stroustrup](https://www.stroustrup.com/)’s use of sam piqued my interest and I thought I’d capture this in my memex/breadcrumbs. I’d love to dig into [sam’s source code](https://github.com/draychev/plan9/blob/main/sys/src/cmd/sam/sam.h) (via [codereading.org](http://codereading.org)) as well as [plan9’s acme](https://github.com/9fans/plan9port/blob/master/src/cmd/acme/acme.c).

 ![image](https://pluralist.net/uploads/default/original/1X/708cfa07cc4be04bd588f8063ff127ebe881dd63.png)

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Today’s Links:

- [https://guardianproject.info/](https://guardianproject.info/)
- [http://mailgun.com/](http://mailgun.com/) – what [Derek Sivers uses](https://sive.rs/uses)
- [Lucida Sans – Lucida Fonts](https://lucidafonts.com/collections/lucida-sans) - the [font Rob Pike and Bjarne Strostrup use](https://pluralist.net/t/famous-computer-scientists-using-proportional-fonts-to-program-rob-pike-bjarne-stroustrup-lucida-grande-2024-01-13/39)

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### How Rob Pike thinks about fixed width fonts

 ![image](https://pluralist.net/uploads/default/original/1X/960d73b4cf6e2059472eb650351f837c7860425f.png)

- **Rob Pike (@rob\_pike · Feb 16, 2015)** – Bigelow&Holmes are having a flash sale this week. LucidaGrande (the font I program in) for $1 instead of $40. [lucidafonts.com/fonts/family/l](http://lucidafonts.com/fonts/family/l)…
- **Mat Ryer (@matryer · Feb 16, 2015)** – Replying to @rob\_pike – @rob\_pike you don’t use a fixed width font for code?
- **Rob Pike (@rob\_pike · Feb 16, 2015)** – Replying to @matryer – @matryer No. Why would I? I don’t use a fixed width font for anything else. Making columns line up is a job for machines not humans.
- **Mat Ryer (@matryer · Feb 16, 2015)** – @rob\_pike but the ‘equals’ don’t line up - `go fmt` insists #ocd 🙂 – _(attached code image)_
- **Rob Pike (@rob\_pike · Feb 16, 2015)** – @matryer It thinks they’re lined up so I am happy because I don’t have to think about it.