On Nov 16, 4:54 pm, Steve Ferg <steve.ferg.bitbuc...@gmail.com> wrote:
> This is a question for the language mavens that I know hang out here.
> It is not Python related, except that recent comparisons of Python to
> Google's new Go language brought it to mind.
>
> NOTE that this is *not* a suggestion to change Python. I like Python
> just the way it is. I'm just curious about language design.
>
> For a long time I've wondered why languages still use blocks
> (delimited by do/end, begin/end, { } , etc.) in ifThenElse statements.
>
> I've often thought that a language with this kind of block-free syntax
> would be nice and intuitive:
>
> if <condition> then
> do stuff
> elif <condition> then
> do stuff
> else
> do stuff
> endif
>
> Note that you do not need block delimiters.
>
> Obviously, you could make a more Pythonesque syntax by using a colon
> rather then "then" for the condition terminator. You could make it
> more PL/I-like by using "do", etc.
>
> You can write shell scripts using if ... fi, but other than that I
> don't recall a language with this kind of syntax.
>
> Does anybody know a language with this kind of syntax for
> ifThenElseEndif?
>
> Is there any particular reason why this might be a *bad* language-
> design idea?
If you search Google, you will likely find some huge comparason of if
or flow control statements in general, in zillions of languages.
I personally like
if expr [then | { | do | :]
the code
[done | } | ]
As long as it starts with if and is immediately followed by expr, I
could care less about the rest, unless someone forgets to document
it ;-). Lisps cond is also sexy.
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