Comments on: If you use an ‘if’ you deserve to suffer http://www.markhneedham.com/blog/2008/10/21/if-you-use-an-if-you-deserve-to-suffer/ Thoughts on Software Development Sat, 11 Feb 2012 23:17:00 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: The Punch Barrel by Frank Carver / If you use an ‘if’ you deserve to suffer http://www.markhneedham.com/blog/2008/10/21/if-you-use-an-if-you-deserve-to-suffer/comment-page-1/#comment-896 The Punch Barrel by Frank Carver / If you use an ‘if’ you deserve to suffer Fri, 24 Oct 2008 08:26:47 +0000 http://www.markhneedham.com/blog/?p=515#comment-896 [...] If you use an ‘if’ you deserve to suffer at Mark Needham [...] [...] If you use an ‘if’ you deserve to suffer at Mark Needham [...]

]]> By: Sarah Taraporewalla http://www.markhneedham.com/blog/2008/10/21/if-you-use-an-if-you-deserve-to-suffer/comment-page-1/#comment-839 Sarah Taraporewalla Tue, 21 Oct 2008 06:35:21 +0000 http://www.markhneedham.com/blog/?p=515#comment-839 ...until you use a 'real' language like python or ruby that is, were brackets are frowned upon. Your first example is correct in python, because the indentation level is identical. ahhh.....languages that a pretty as well as smart. …until you use a ‘real’ language like python or ruby that is, were brackets are frowned upon. Your first example is correct in python, because the indentation level is identical. ahhh…..languages that a pretty as well as smart.

]]> By: Kris Kemper http://www.markhneedham.com/blog/2008/10/21/if-you-use-an-if-you-deserve-to-suffer/comment-page-1/#comment-834 Kris Kemper Tue, 21 Oct 2008 02:57:43 +0000 http://www.markhneedham.com/blog/?p=515#comment-834 Use braces. Developers love leaving them out, but I find that it constantly results in developers forgetting them when adding a second condition. While the loss in time is often small, say a few minutes to figure it out on average, those situations can be avoided by just putting them in. Every little bit helps, and can add up to a lot. Also, I feel like you didn't pursue the concept of removing if's from a codebase entirely. As mentioned by the blog in the link you mentioned, if's that decide based on type are a clear smell for some polymorphism. On the other hand, there is a line where a simple if statement introduces less complexity than a pattern to get around it. I've worked with developers that when they see an if statement, they say "Hey, you can avoid that with a strategy pattern." While that may make sense in some cases, in others, it's going to result in the creation of a new object hierarchy, and only one code location that uses this forced polymorphic approach. Sometimes, you just can't beat a simple if statement. Use braces. Developers love leaving them out, but I find that it constantly results in developers forgetting them when adding a second condition. While the loss in time is often small, say a few minutes to figure it out on average, those situations can be avoided by just putting them in. Every little bit helps, and can add up to a lot.

Also, I feel like you didn’t pursue the concept of removing if’s from a codebase entirely. As mentioned by the blog in the link you mentioned, if’s that decide based on type are a clear smell for some polymorphism.

On the other hand, there is a line where a simple if statement introduces less complexity than a pattern to get around it. I’ve worked with developers that when they see an if statement, they say “Hey, you can avoid that with a strategy pattern.” While that may make sense in some cases, in others, it’s going to result in the creation of a new object hierarchy, and only one code location that uses this forced polymorphic approach. Sometimes, you just can’t beat a simple if statement.

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