something like "if" that returns a value?

[Paul Rudin]

>>>>> "hk" == holger krekel <pyth at devel.trillke.net> writes:

 hk> Paul Rudin wrote:

 >> - potentially both y and z are evaluated; and

 hk> no.  more precisely, only

 hk>     if x is true and y is false is z also considered.

I said "potentially" - so we're agreeing - there are circumstances in
which both y and z have to be evaluated. Sometimes this might not
matter, others it could be very significant.


 >> - there's a degree of obfuscation here, the code is less
 >> comprehensible than something like: if x then y else z.

 hk> IMO it's not overly hard to get used to it. It certainly isn't as
 hk> evident (as has the aforementioned pitfall) as in some other
 hk> languages.  Funny enough, i don't need this ternary operation
 hk> often.

 hk> And if one the expressions is more complex i use a proper
 hk> if-clause.

I guess these things depend on what you're used to - I now program
mostly in lisp; I used to program mostly in c++; I'm very used to
using such a construct. Using an if-then-else type construct without a
return value makes some code rather inelegant, it seems to me. But no
doubt one can get used to it.

-- 
Were these parsnips CORRECTLY MARINATED in TACO SAUCE?