I wonder what the programmer was going to do..

inch

I just found this in some ancient C code:

if (number_of_records > 0)
{}
else
{}

I'd love to know what the original programmer was intending to do here because I have to maintain this crap! X|

Sandeep Singh Shekhawat

He was just explaining syntax of if...else to his/her co-programmer. The co-programmer was free to cook anything between these {}.

snorkie

There is the code I was looking for! Could you please tell me what file its in now :-D

OriginalGriff

It's a long standing game of Code Tennis. You fill in the "if" part, and send it back for his move on the "else".

Never underestimate the power of stupid things in large numbers --- Serious Sam

inch

Yes, its in a function called read_the_mi_file() in MINSERT.C If you'd like to take ownership of the whole pile of BS I'll ZIP it up for you..

tgrt

He had that variable number_of_records sitting around and had to do something with it.

MarkTJohnson

Look at the bright side. There's nothing to undo with this code.

BillW33

The real question isn't what the original programmer was intending to do, but what do you need to do if number_of_records > 0 ? ;)

Just because the code works, it doesn't mean that it is good code.

phil o

OP may just have built this piece of code to prevent a warning saying that variable 'number_of_records' has been declared but is never used. Quite brilliant, actually.

Women are composed of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen; men are also composed of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen, but in such proportions that force respect.

Lutoslaw

Looks like an incomplete sanity check. It should be:

if (number_of_records > 0)
{}
else if (number_of_records <= 0)
{}
else
{
// I segfault myself.
printf("%d", *(int*)666);
}

Greetings - Jacek

Prabhu S M

It's always good to check whether a particular record is existing or not before accessing that record. Specially in collections, sometimes it maybe empty or less than the number of required records that you want to access. The following code will execute based on the records available

        DataTable table = new System.Data.DataTable();
        table.Columns.Add("ID");
        table.Rows.Add("1");
        string test = string.Empty;

        int num\_of\_records = table.Rows.Count;
        if (num\_of\_records > 0)
        {
            test = table.Rows\[0\]\[0\].ToString();
        }
        else
        {
            return;
        }

The following code is directly trying to access a record which may or may not be existing though the code is syntactically correct it may throw error in the event of unavailablity of records.

        DataTable table = new System.Data.DataTable();
        table.Columns.Add("ID");            
        string test = string.Empty;
        test = table.Rows\[0\]\[0\].ToString();

IndexOutOfRangeException - There is no row at position 0.

Paul Conrad

I agree, and the original post was probably more of a question of what the developer intended to do inside the {} in both the if part and the else part; which of course could be anything. If anything it's just dead code the compiler would likely cut out.

"I've seen more information on a frickin' sticky note!" - Dave Kreskowiak