/Looks up from editing fortran77
/shakes fist at pesky kids

(seriously though - any language with line length restrictions due to the size of punchcards should be dead and buried. Why oh why it still exists in physics is beyond me)

As for svg files, I can entirely see the OP's point. I've done a bit of editing eps files by hand too and it's surprisingly straighforward, though I haven't done the same with svg.