Question

Which of these is better Ruby code formatting style, and why?

Option A:

def load_business
  @business ||= if params[:badge_uuid] 
    # some code
  else
    # some other code
  end
end

Option B:

def load_business
  @business ||= if params[:badge_uuid] 
                  # some code
                else
                  # some other code
                end
end

Answer 1

It’s a subjective question, so we can only give (hopefully reasoned) opinions. I always use option A. My rationale:

1. The block of code is opened and closed at the same indentation-level, that creates a “visual cohesion”.

2. If the variable name changes its size, you don’t need to edit anything (some text editors handle this automatically, though).

3. You create a “hole” in the source code. The larger the variable name, the bigger the hole. IMO this is visually annoying. Also, you have less space available till reaching some reasonable 80/100-char limit.

I use this style when writing multi-line hashes/arrays/… (note the comma also in the last element so we can re-order them easily and in diff-friendly way):

hash = {
  :a => 1,
  :b => 2,
}

array = [
  :a, 
  :b,
]