Conditional

Switch Statements

Our Switch Statements got a lot of rework from normal switch statements you see in other languages. Normal features from the switch statement behave as expected

switch element {
    case value: { print("its the value"); break; }
    default: print("its not the value :c");
}

The example is great for one of our new features. Do you see how annoying it is that we had to use curly braces just because we need a break? For these things, we can just type break before our case like so

switch element {
    break case value: print("its the value");
    default: print("its not the value :c");
}

But look! What if we want an if clause after the first case so that it only gets executed when the first case failed and couldn't break. Yeah, normally we would end the switch, then make the if statement and then put the default code in the else branch. But doesn't that sound complicated? Yes, cause it is! In Back, you can just put if statements into a switch statement and also break in them like so

switch element {
    break case value: print("its the value");
    break if myFunction(element): print("my function likes it :D");
    default: print("its not the value :c");
}

Ok, but we got even more to show you. For example, you can check two values in one case by just typing

switch element {
    break case value: print("its the value");
    break if myFunction(element): print("my function likes it :D");
    break case value1 || value2: print("its one of those values");
    default: print("its not the value :c");
}

But what's when you want to check a method of the element? And the element changes? For example switch (getRandomUUID()) { /*...*/ } Of course we have a solution for that! The when keyword

switch element {
    break case value: print("its the value");
    break if myFunction(element): print("my function likes it :D");
    break case value1 || value2: print("its one of those values");
    when >= 17: {
        print("element is greater or equal to 17.");
        break;
    }
    break when isCool(): print("converts to if element.isCool()");
    default: print("its not the value :c");
}

Exercices

1. Why you would use an switch-statement instead of an if-statement?