From: Niklas Frykholm <r2d2@...>
Date: 2001-08-08T16:15:20+09:00
Subject: [ruby-talk:19356] Re: Help with ternary operator syntax and grammar

> But, don't you think this is a weired grammar?  In the following, the
> second line prints ", ", but the third prints "true":
> 
> 	cond = 1
> 	print  cond == 1  ? ", " : "\n"
> 	print (cond == 1) ? ", " : "\n"
> 
> I think this is very counter-intuitive.  What's the rationale for this
> interpretation?

There is a third example to consider

1:	print  cond == 1  ? ", " : "\n"
2:	print (cond == 1) ? ", " : "\n"
3:	print(cond==1)    ? ", " : "\n"

In 1 and 3 the semantic is obvious -- if you want to follow standard
conventions. In 2 it is less obvious. You have to pick one meaning 1 or 3
or generate a syntax error and whatever you do you will probably annoy
or confuse some people. (Personally, I tend to go with 1 even though it
makes the parsing whitespace-dependant.)

For clarity, it is probably best to always use parenthesis in the method
call when you have complex arguments:

	print( (cond==1) ? ", " : "\n" )

// Niklas