PEP308 - preference for 'x if c else y' over 'c then x else y'

[Erik Max Francis]

Stephen Horne wrote:

> I'm still catching up on these threads, I admit. I just spotted a
> suggestion you made which makes a lot of sense to me... the 'if ...
> then ... else ...'. Looking back, I already used it (accidentally) in
> my first post in this thread when I intended to use the '... then ...
> else ...' form. It's still a ternary operator, but the leading 'if'
> warns you what's coming and makes a big difference to readability.

The `if C then x else y' form was originally listed as an alternative in
the PEP.  Its main point of contention was that the use of `if' made it
_harder_ to read, since it could be confused with an `if' statement.  I
personally don't buy into that argument, but that's mainly where the `C
then x else y' alternative came from.  That is, it came about precisely
because some weren't satisfied with the alternative you're suggesting
(which, again, was in the PEP originally).

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