This is so very wrong....<p>&gt;  tabs are bad, because if you let people choose their own tab widths then it becomes impossible to align anything anymore.<p>In what world is that true. If you indent your code with tabs, and I indent your code with tabs and I show my tabs as 4 chars wide and you show yours and 8 EVERYTHING IS STILL ALIGNED. It&#x27;s just greater or lesser levels of indentation. You only have problems when you MIX tabs and spaces. Be consistent in your use and you won&#x27;t have problems.<p>&gt; It makes it impossible to align anything which is != a tab width.<p>Yes. So? Don&#x27;t mix tabs and spaces.<p>&gt; Tabs aren&#x27;t &quot;designed&quot; for indenting text: they&#x27;re a hangover from typewriters, where they were literally metal tabs used for creating tables.<p>What is a table? It&#x27;s a tool FOR ALIGNING MULTIPLE COLUMNS OF TEXT... so yes, they ARE designed for indenting text.<p>For a more fully thought out argument on why it&#x27;s a dick move to use spaces as pretend tabs: <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;weblog.masukomi.org&#x2F;2010&#x2F;07&#x2F;26&#x2F;why-you-should-never-indent-code-with-spaces&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;weblog.masukomi.org&#x2F;2010&#x2F;07&#x2F;26&#x2F;why-you-should-never-i...</a>