From: MenTaLguY <mental@...>
Date: 2007-10-31T03:54:00+09:00
Subject: Re: RUBY DRY to replace 6 lines in 1

On Wed, 31 Oct 2007 03:25:03 +0900, Josselin <josselin@wanadoo.fr> wrote:
> thanks a lot..  when trying to get DRY,  I just wonder if it helps in
> performance ..
> in both cases we perform 6 IF..

I'd be more concerned with the multiple calls to #distance_to in the
original.

If there could be a lot of zoom levels (~50 or more), then it might
be worthwhile to replace the linear search with a binary search (giving
you only log2(N) tests to do rather than the full N), but with the small
number of zoom levels available in Google Maps, the extra complexity
likely isn't worth it.

I also wouldn't worry too much about performance unless this particular
piece of code is a measurable hot spot in your performance profile.  
Otherwise, it's easy to tie yourself into knots worrying about the
performance of things which cannot have a significant impact on execution
time.

In the beginning, just focus on clarity and maintainability (which is what
DRY really speaks to):  you'll often get a little performance improvement
and shorter code as side benefits without having to worry about either
directly.

-mental