\end{memberdesc}
\begin{memberdesc}[file]{newlines}
-If Python was built with the \code{--with-universal-newlines} option
-(the default) this read-only attribute exists, and for files opened in
+If Python was built with the \longprogramopt{with-universal-newlines}
+option to \program{configure} (the default) this read-only attribute
+exists, and for files opened in
universal newline read mode it keeps track of the types of newlines
encountered while reading the file. The values it can take are
\code{'\e r'}, \code{'\e n'}, \code{'\e r\e n'}, \code{None} (unknown,
destroys objects. The detection of cycles can be disabled when Python
is compiled, if you can't afford even a tiny speed penalty or suspect
that the cycle collection is buggy, by specifying the
-\samp{--without-cycle-gc} switch when running the \file{configure}
-script.
+\longprogramopt{without-cycle-gc} switch when running the
+\program{configure} script.
Several people tackled this problem and contributed to a solution. An
early implementation of the cycle detection approach was written by