Legible or not: C# multiple ternary operators + Throw if unmatched [closed]

Answer 1

My rule of thumb: use expressions for things with no side effects. Use statements for things with one side effect and for control flow.

Throwing is effectively a side effect; it does not compute a value, it alters control flow. You're computing a value, computing, computing, computing, and then boom, side effect. I find code like that confusing and vexing. I say that control flow should be in statements, not the side effect of something that looks like a computation.

Answer 2

I really don't like this code. It took me more than about 15 seconds to understand, so I gave up.

An if/then would be preferable.

Answer 3

Unfortunately the ternary operator (?:) isn't a common idiom in the C languages--I've met many C, C++ and C# developers who have to pause to read it because they aren't familiar with it or don't use it. That does not make it a bad language feature or illegible, however those same developers may call OP's example illegible because it nests a language feature they're uncomfortable with.

I don't find the example illegible--I've seen nested ternary operators many times. However, I do feel that using a switch would be a preferable choice for checking 'parameter' against the strings.

Far more galling to me is that Throw extension method that ignores the 'this' parameter. What would 42.Throw(...) mean? If I were reviewing the code I would call it out as bad design.