On Wed, 18 Jul 2012 15:40:00 +0100, Lipska the Kat wrote: [...] >> Even with a break, why bother continuing through the body of the >> function when you already have the result? When your calculation is >> done, it's done, just return for goodness sake. You wouldn't write a >> search that keeps going after you've found the value that you want, out >> of some misplaced sense that you have to look at every value. Why write >> code with unnecessary guard values and temporary variables out of a >> misplaced sense that functions must only have one exit? > > Object Oriented programming is all about encapsulating human concepts in > a way that makes sense to human beings. Make no mistake, it is NEVER the > case that a software system is written for any other reason than to > serve human beings. OO is more than just the mechanics of writing code, > it's a state of mind.
Um, yes? I'm no sure what this has to do with single-exit functions/methods. You can just as easily write multi-exit methods in an OO language as in a non- OO language. So long as your language has a return statement which exits the function, you can have more than one. I am aware that some languages enforce a single exit point, but that seems to be an unnecessary restriction to me. Of course it does require discipline and/or sense to not write crap code: if you have a 300 line function or method, whether it has dozens of exits or just one, that is crap code in any language. But if the choice is to write a 20 line function with three exits, or a 30 line function with a single exit, there would have to be a good reason to prefer the single- exit version. -- Steven -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
