OpenEuphoria

Re: ideas from CCC 1.

• Posted by Robert Craig <rds at RapidEuphoria.com> Feb 16, 2004
• 461 views

Guest wrote:
> I am working on creating a function library which will be made public,
> from the best CCC functions, 

Great.

> but there are ones that I cannot make.
> ...
> 1. The if() function
> 
> the if() function is something like:
> 
> -- code start
> function if(atom condition, object truevalue, object falsevalue)
>    object retval
>    if condition then 
>       return truevalue
>    end if
>     return falsevalue   
> end function
> -- code end
> 
> and it could be used the following way, for example:
> 
> atom lgt
> object something
> 
> lgt=if(sequence(something),length(something),0)
> 
> It would greatly reduce coding time, and would promote
> a very good programming style, I think.
> 
> The problem is:
> 
> The parameters are evaluated "too early". In the above example,
> if something is an atom, then you have an error. 
> But the goal of if() is to evaluate the parameters only 
 > when the condition if true or false - so in the example, it should
 > evaluate length(something) if the sequence(something)
 > condition is true.
> 
> Can it be made in EU or could I ask Rob to incorporate it in the 
> interpreter? I think it can be incorporated in the interpreter 
 > easily if one can code in C (I myself cannot  ) because
 > it's just a different parsing route:
 >
> 1) evaluate param1 to 0 or non-0 
 >
> 2) if param1 is non-0 then evaluate and return param2
 >
> 3) if param1 is 0 then evaluate and return param2. 
 >
> It can't be complicated, can it? 
> 
> It would really be useful - in a CCC program, almost every 20. line
> contains an if() and it really quickens up coding.
> 
> Best Regards,
> 
> Miklos Hollender

Thanks for the suggestion.
In C they have conditional expressions using ? and :
for example:
      max = (a > b) ? a : b

I've sometimes felt that something like this would be
convenient, but you can always do it as
      if a > b then
           max = a
      else
           max = b
      end if

which is longer but just as readable.

My basic philosophy favors minimalism over
having lots of minor conveniences.

Regards,
    Rob Craig
    Rapid Deployment Software
    http://www.RapidEuphoria.com