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Re: expressions vs. statements
Date: Tue, 18 Dec 2001 23:01:24 -0500
From: Paul Prescod <paul@prescod.net>
...
In Perl, you often see code like this:
print "abc";
print "def";
5; # returns 5
That's just weird to me...the value of the last statement in a block is
just the value of the last statement in a block.
I believe you when you say it's just weird to you. But let's
look a little deeper.
If you want it to be
the value of the block you should say so. ...
(a) Why?
(b) One could argue that you *do* say so: the way that you
say what the value of a block is, is to state that value at
the end of the block.
(c) What, did you want a "noise word"? A noise word makes sense
if returning a special value is the uncommon case. Maybe in
your style of programming or your favorite language, that is
indeed an uncommon case. But what if it were the common case
(as it is in Lisp)?
(d) would you be happier if there were no semicolon after the 5?
--Guy