Does anyone know anymore Shorthand Action Script 3?

Question

I'm used to using the if else shorthand:

var = (if statement) ? 'something' : 'something else';

Are there any other short hand methods available?

Answer 1

Strictly speaking, that is not shorthand for an if/else statement. That's a ternary operator called a conditional operator.

Notice that while these do the same thing, they read differently:

// if the condition is true, we do something... maybe many things
if (condition) {
  var = 'something';
} else {
  var = 'something else';
}

// reads more clearly as an assignment based upon a condition
var = (condition) ? 'something' : 'something else';

In many cases it's fine to think of it as shorthand. Over time, your brain will instincitvely select a conditional operator where appropriate; but as you're just getting your feet wet you'll find the conditional operator to be a great way to express code more succinctly.

Answer 2

Not sure if this fits into what you're asking, but this also works:

var myVar:String = someStrThatMightBeNull || "default value if that other value is null";

So, if the first value to the right of the assignment operator is null/undefined, it will use the literal string.

Answer 3

var myArray:Array = new Array();

Can be replaced with:

var myArray:Array = [];

Same goes for objects:

var myObj:Object = new Object();

Can be replaced with:

var myObj:Object = {};