Question

In the case of languages that support single decision and action without brackets, such as the following example:

if (var == true)     doSomething(); 

What is the preferred way of writing this? Should brackets always be used, or should their usage be left as a preference of the individual developer? Additionally, does this practice depend on the size of the code block, such as in the following example:

if (var == 1)     doSomething(1); else if (var > 1 && var < 10)     doSomething(2); else {     validate(var);     doSomething(var); } 

Answer 1

There isn’t really a right answer. This is what coding standards within the company are for. If you can keep it consistent across the whole company then it will be easy to read. I personally like

if ( a == b)    {     doSomething(); } else {     doSomething(); } 

but this is a holy war.