April 28, 2004
What did you learn today?
I can't believe I didn't know this one... Actually, I think I did know it, but I've been coding with a certain style for so long that it influenced my view of syntax requirements.. For example, did you know that you can write code that looks like this...
x = String. fromCharCode(123); trace(x); // {
... and it works just fine? The above behaves just like x = String.fromCharCode. The extra spaces, line feeds, tabs, etc, are all ignored around the dot operator.
Similarly,
var a:Array = new Array("1", "2", "3"); trace(a. join("."));
... traces "1.2.3" to the output window, just as expected.
I don't recall encountering this before in my years of programming. I might've, but haven't thought about it or just glazed over it. I've always omitted any sort of spaces around the . operator (and the -> operator in C++) as a habit (example: Class.method, not Class . method). It somewhat surprised me to find out that whitespace like this is ignored.. and not just by ActionScript. Java, C# and C++ all behave similarly. However, ColdFusion will generate a syntax error - 'The variable StructTest. ends with a "." character. You must supply an additional structure key or delete the "." character.'
I'm not recommending that you space your code like I have above, but it's interesting to note that you can if you want to. It's easy to envision situations where having that type of freedom is useful, but I think it would pollute code readability if used liberally.
Learn something new every day....
Comments
It can actually be a nice way to break long lines of chained method calls (although my style is to break *before* the . or -> selector rather than after it).
I've seen code that uses a style something like this as a matter of course (not in AS but I'll use your AS code as an example):
trace ( a . join ( "." ) ) ;
I really don't like that - I think both the function call operator and the selector should be "bound" to something without the space so this is more palatable to me:
trace( a
.join( "." )
);
Posted by: Sean Corfield at April 28, 2004 06:23 PM
I used to break up long SQL statements into several lines, especially for Stored Procedures.
Posted by: Owen van Dijk at April 29, 2004 09:17 AM
Hi,
I encountered same thing several times in past. But the very first time, i wondered but after testing i found it works. An thought, since . is like an operator it behaves like other operators.
Regards,
Abdul
Posted by: Abdul Qabiz at April 29, 2004 10:03 AM
All good 'till MM will publish their next flash player (or next-next flash player) which will not support this kind of practice. same thing as the Case Sensetive issue.
don't ya think?
Posted by: Matti at May 2, 2004 01:32 AM
Neat, just hope people don't start thinking it's PHP :p (wish they would switch to + for concatenation! :/)
Posted by: Richard Leggett at May 7, 2004 08:03 AM