Re: [PATCH] git-svn: handle leading/trailing whitespace from svnsync revprops

Eric Wong <normalperson@yhbt.net> writes:

When I checked tmp_config(), I thought that it was returning the first element (taking the output of "config --get" as a LF-terminated list) when called in list context, so this would give the correct sync-url after stripping the trailing LF for Dennis's case. The first assignment looks fine, but the second one looks very funny.

Is it only me who finds that

	($var) = ($var =~ m{^(any regexp)$}) or die "message"

is extremely a roundabout and hard-to-read way to say:

	if ($var !~ m{^(the same regexp)$} {
        	die "message";
	}

which is much easier to read?

I said the first one looks fine, but actually I really _hate_ Perl subs that use wantarray and return one element in scalar context, and return a list in list context.

This forces the programmer who calls the sub to read the code of the sub and know that it uses this unusual calling convention. It forbids them to rely on their common-sense acquired from experience while coding in Perl, that most functions do not do that, and a usual sub that is capable of returning a list in a list context you can find out the number of elemenets, the first element, and the first few elements by using:

	sub returns_list {
        	my @a = qw(a b c);
                return @a;
	}

	my $number_of_elems = returns_list();
	my ($first_element) = returns_list();
	my ($first, $second) = returns_list();

IOW, writing

	sub returns_funny {
        	my @a = qw(a b c);
                return wantarray ? @a : $a[0];
	}

may make you feel as if you have become a power-coder, and might even give you a false sense that some parts of your code can become simpler thanks to that, because you can now write:

	my $first_element = returns_list();

i.e. you did not have to type WHOLE TWO LETTERS ( and )!

But in the longer run, when you want/need other people to help maintaining such a code, you create unnecessary burden on them.