If...Or...Then

[David McFarlane]

Matt,

I second Mich's sentiment, and will use stronger language -- your code 
is a horrible mess!  It is just plain ugly!  People may complain that I 
harp too much on the virtue of making code "beautiful", but I find that 
making code beautiful also often makes it just work better, and many 
code problems result just from ugliness.  So...

- Your code is yet another ugly case of using multiple If...End If 
instead of If...ElseIf...Else...End If.  I will leave this as an 
exercise for you.  See the online E-Basic Help, and my many other 
complaints about this here on the Google Group.

- Better yet, as Mich hinted, see if you can cast this into a 
Select...Case structure.

- As Mich also said, use parentheses liberally.  I just had a private 
argument with Brandon Cernicky at PST about this very issue, you prove 
my point that more parentheses are generally desirable.

- Even better, looking at your code it looks like you actually have a 
cascade of several different conditions.  In that case, just reorganize 
this into a set of nested If...Then or Select...Case.  That could also 
eliminate the And clause, possibly more.  So, something along the lines of

Select LotteryChoice.RESP
Case 1
     If ((c.GetAttrib("FeedBack1") = "0") OR _
         (c.GetAttrib("FeedBack2") = "0") OR _
         (c.GetAttrib("FeedBack3") = "0")) Then _
         Set Slide1.ActiveState = "Default1"
     ....
Case 2
     ....
Case 3
     ....
Case Else
     MsgBox "Invalid LotteryChoice.RESP"
End Select

- Finally, before you even set about to code this any further, first sit 
down and make a complete logic table of all the combinatoric conditional 
possibilities and the desired result for each combination.  You have a 
small finite set of conditions, so this should not take much trouble.  I 
do this all the time whenever I face a similar situation, it really 
helps to untangle the logic and then I can code it rationally and 
quickly.  And if you do not understand what I am talking about, then 
take a class that covers propositional (i.e., Boolean) logic and 
combinatorics, its not that hard.

-- David McFarlane, Professional Faultfinder


Michiel Spape wrote:
> Hi,
> It gives me headache just looking at it! I'm sure David mcF would be better at cleaning this up, but: 
> 1. try to separate multiple AND/ORs using brackets, unless you're REALLY sure about eBasic's priority: does AND go before =, does equal go before OR, does AND go before OR? I'm assuming you mean IF (LotteryChoice.RESP = "1" and (c.GetAttrib("Feedback1") = "0" or c.GetAttrib("Feedback2") = "0" or c.GetAttrib("Feedback3") = "0") then.
> 2. AND ...(c.GetAttrib("Feedback1") = "0" OR ... etc
> Is the same as c.GetAttrib("Feedback1") * c.GetAttrib("Feedback2") * c.GetAttrib("Feedback3") = 0. Awesome trick, no?
> 3. how about:
> ----
> If (c.GetAttrib("FeedBack1") * c.GetAttrib("FeedBack2") * c.GetAttrib("Feedback3")) = 0 then
>   Set Slide1.ActiveState = "Default" & LotteryChoice.RESP ' ...assuming it can be 1 to 3
> End if
> ....
> 4. Do stuff with else and cases. Also, you might wish to nest bits.
> 5. The problem, if you say every IF here turns out wrong is indeed either in your ifs, so you need to clean those up, or in the premises (LotteryChoice.RESP, c.GetAttrib("Feedback")). Why don't you debug.print what the answer to the premises is?
> Debug.print "LotteryChoice.RESP was " & LotteryChoice.RESP
> Debug.print "Feedback1 was: " & c.GetAttrib("Feedback1").
> If it so happens that these are correctly found at the level of your script, and your IF statements still all turn false, then your IF statements are false, so your IF-THENs are not working (I also make messy ones from time to time!). 
> Cheers,
> Mich
> 
> 
> If LotteryChoice.RESP = "1" And c.GetAttrib("FeedBack1") = "0"
>  OR c.GetAttrib("FeedBack2") = "0" OR c.GetAttrib("FeedBack3") = "0"
> Then
>  Set Slide1.ActiveState = "Default1"
> End If
> If LotteryChoice.RESP = "2" And c.GetAttrib("FeedBack1") = "0" OR
> c.GetAttrib("FeedBack2") = "0" OR c.GetAttrib("FeedBack3") = "0" Then
>  Set Slide1.ActiveState = "Default2"
> End If
> If LotteryChoice.RESP = "3" And c.GetAttrib("FeedBack1") = "0" OR
> c.GetAttrib("FeedBack2") = "0" OR c.GetAttrib("FeedBack3") = "0" Then
>  Set Slide1.ActiveState = "Default3"
> End If
> If LotteryChoice.RESP = "1" And c.GetAttrib("FeedBack1") = "1" OR
> c.GetAttrib("FeedBack2") = "1" OR c.GetAttrib("FeedBack3") = "1" Then
>  Set Slide1.ActiveState = "Victory1"
> End If
> If LotteryChoice.RESP = "2" And c.GetAttrib("FeedBack1") = "1" OR
> c.GetAttrib("FeedBack2") = "1" OR c.GetAttrib("FeedBack3") = "1" Then
>  Set Slide1.ActiveState = "Victory2"
> End If
> If LotteryChoice.RESP = "3" And c.GetAttrib("FeedBack1") = "1" OR
> c.GetAttrib("FeedBack2") = "1" OR c.GetAttrib("FeedBack3") = "1" Then
>  Set Slide1.ActiveState = "Victory3"
> End If
> If LotteryChoice.RESP = "1" And c.GetAttrib("FeedBack1") = "2" OR
> c.GetAttrib("FeedBack2") = "2" OR c.GetAttrib("FeedBack3") = "2" Then
>  Set Slide1.ActiveState = "Lose1"
> End If
> If LotteryChoice.RESP = "2" And c.GetAttrib("FeedBack1") = "2" OR
> c.GetAttrib("FeedBack2") = "2" OR c.GetAttrib("FeedBack3") = "2" Then
>  Set Slide1.ActiveState = "Lose2"
> End If
> If LotteryChoice.RESP = "3" And c.GetAttrib("FeedBack1") = "2" OR
> c.GetAttrib("FeedBack2") = "2" OR c.GetAttrib("FeedBack3") = "2" Then
>  Set Slide1.ActiveState = "Lose3"
> End If
> 
> 
> Michiel Spapé
> Research Fellow
> Perception & Action group
> University of Nottingham
> School of Psychology
> www.cognitology.eu
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: e-prime at googlegroups.com [mailto:e-prime at googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Matt Paffel
> Sent: 22 September 2010 22:35
> To: E-Prime
> Subject: If...Or...Then
> 
> Hello
> 
> I have Multiple slideslates that I'm tring to change based on the
> script below, however the script isn't performing as I'd like it to.
> 
> The message from the output window after debugging states:
> 
> 3Lose3
> False
> 2Lose3
> False
> 1Lose3
> False
> 
> This tells me that it's collecting the responses correctly and setting
> a slide state but it looks as though the program is going through the
> arguments and declaring them all false, which is not the case. Is
> there something I need to include as the arguments make use of the
> "OR" statement or is something else such as my overzealous use of the
> If...Then statement?
> 
> Note: I've added indents here to make it easier to look at.
> 
> 
> If LotteryChoice.RESP = "1" And c.GetAttrib("FeedBack1") = "0"_
>  OR c.GetAttrib("FeedBack2") = "0" OR c.GetAttrib("FeedBack3") = "0"
> Then
>  Set Slide1.ActiveState = "Default1"
> End If
> If LotteryChoice.RESP = "2" And c.GetAttrib("FeedBack1") = "0" OR
> c.GetAttrib("FeedBack2") = "0" OR c.GetAttrib("FeedBack3") = "0" Then
>  Set Slide1.ActiveState = "Default2"
> End If
> If LotteryChoice.RESP = "3" And c.GetAttrib("FeedBack1") = "0" OR
> c.GetAttrib("FeedBack2") = "0" OR c.GetAttrib("FeedBack3") = "0" Then
>  Set Slide1.ActiveState = "Default3"
> End If
> If LotteryChoice.RESP = "1" And c.GetAttrib("FeedBack1") = "1" OR
> c.GetAttrib("FeedBack2") = "1" OR c.GetAttrib("FeedBack3") = "1" Then
>  Set Slide1.ActiveState = "Victory1"
> End If
> If LotteryChoice.RESP = "2" And c.GetAttrib("FeedBack1") = "1" OR
> c.GetAttrib("FeedBack2") = "1" OR c.GetAttrib("FeedBack3") = "1" Then
>  Set Slide1.ActiveState = "Victory2"
> End If
> If LotteryChoice.RESP = "3" And c.GetAttrib("FeedBack1") = "1" OR
> c.GetAttrib("FeedBack2") = "1" OR c.GetAttrib("FeedBack3") = "1" Then
>  Set Slide1.ActiveState = "Victory3"
> End If
> If LotteryChoice.RESP = "1" And c.GetAttrib("FeedBack1") = "2" OR
> c.GetAttrib("FeedBack2") = "2" OR c.GetAttrib("FeedBack3") = "2" Then
>  Set Slide1.ActiveState = "Lose1"
> End If
> If LotteryChoice.RESP = "2" And c.GetAttrib("FeedBack1") = "2" OR
> c.GetAttrib("FeedBack2") = "2" OR c.GetAttrib("FeedBack3") = "2" Then
>  Set Slide1.ActiveState = "Lose2"
> End If
> If LotteryChoice.RESP = "3" And c.GetAttrib("FeedBack1") = "2" OR
> c.GetAttrib("FeedBack2") = "2" OR c.GetAttrib("FeedBack3") = "2" Then
>  Set Slide1.ActiveState = "Lose3"
> End If

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