in reply to (crazyinsomniac) Re: Coding superstitions
in thread Coding superstitions

I know what you mean about returning things. I think it's a deep brainwash from all other languages that says unused expressions are useless. Then there's the case where you can't tell at a glance which line acually does the returning. I like returns.

On a related (im|ex)plicit note, I argued once when I was at uni about this code: 

sub fred {
    if ($_[0] == 'ooyah') {
        return 1;
    } else {
        return 0;
    }
}

[download]
The lecturer insisted that I should take out the else and leave the last return dangling there. I still don't know which I prefer.

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: Re: (crazyinsomniac) Re: Coding superstitions
by blakem (Monsignor) on Jan 09, 2002 at 00:24 UTC
    Assuming you don't mind returning 1/undef instead of 1/0 I'd prefer this: 
    sub fred { $_[0] eq 'ooyah' }

    [download]
    Or, if you want to keep your '0', how about: 
    sub fred { $_[0] eq 'ooyah' or 0 }

    [download]

    -Blake

[reply]
[d/l]
[select]
      Well caught; the class was actually in Java, but I transliterated the example.
[reply]
Re: Re: (crazyinsomniac) Re: Coding superstitions
by talexb (Chancellor) on Jan 09, 2002 at 19:37 UTC
    I would replace that entire routine with the ? thingie, as in 
    sub fred
{
  return ( ( $_[0] eq 'ooyah' ) ? 1 : 0 );
}

    [download]
    Gee, I didn't realize until I was replying that you used == and I corrected that to eq. Not bad for some guy who wrote C code forever.

    And I disagree with the lecturer about leaving the last return to dangle -- what he/she suggested is obsfucation, and you're not doing yourself any favours with that approach.

    --t. alex

    "Excellent. Release the hounds." -- Monty Burns.

[reply]
[d/l]
[select]
Re: Re: (crazyinsomniac) Re: Coding superstitions
by seattlejohn (Deacon) on Jan 15, 2002 at 12:24 UTC
    FWIW, I prefer your version, simply because my brain effortlessly translates the else into $_[0] != 'ooyah', so it is immediately clear to me that the block gets executed if and only if $_[0] != 'ooyah'. I think I can understand the prof's desire for the "dangling return", but I also think it would require a few more clock cycles for my brain to look at that and be convinced exactly under which conditions 0 would be returned. (At the very least, I'd have to see the return 1 above to know that the return 0 would never get executed if the if was true -- because the if might just have done some work without actually returning...)
[reply]
[d/l]
[select]

In Section Meditations