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Re: Are there any plans for more readable, modern syntaxes for If statements?

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    Date:        Fri, 13 Mar 2020 06:59:56 -0500
    From:        John McKown <john.archie.mckown@gmail.com>
    Message-ID:  <CAAJSdjidSYg1yoWC7UbbLUUDF3ug9ekDtkOP7Er-JOjrLoDssQ@mail.gmail.com>


  | I do things like:
  |
  | test <some relational test> && { true_command1;true_command2; : ; } || {
  | false_command1; false_command2; false_command3; }

That's OK, and at times I have been tempted that way, but it really is
easier to just do

	if <some relational test>
	then
		true_command1
		true_command2
	else
		false_command1
		false_command2
		false_command3
	fi

Not only do you not need to remember that the ':' command (or "true") is
important, but the exit status of all of this will be whichever of
true_command2 or false_command3 that was executed, which can be
used in other tests later.

The cost of typing a few extra words to make things clearer, and having
the code not look quite so "look what I can do ma" (ie: less "cool") is
worth it to be more clear, and less likely to have bugs.

kre

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Re: Are there any plans for more readable, modern syntaxes for If statements? Robert Elz <kre@munnari.OZ.AU> - 2020-03-13 21:52 +0700

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