How to return values with if/else and if condition in function

Questions / Help
,
1

Hi everyone, I am new to Elixir. I have a function and in this function:

if type == "followers" do
  users = ....
else
  users = ....
end

if options != nil do
  users = ....
end

How can I do this and make sure that the users in the first if/else block will be used in the next if block?

2

Instead of assigning users in the if clause you assign "the result"t of the if clause to the variable.

def yourfun() do
  users = if type == "followers" do
      ....
   else
       ....
  end    

  if options != nil do
     ....
  else
     users
  end
  
end
3 Likes
3

Just to add to previous post…

If You don’t do this, You will have a scoping problem, and users disappear after the end of the block :slight_smile:

4

And if you want to avoid if else clauses this can be written using more functions.

def yourfun(users, type, options) do
    users
    |> filter_users(type)
    |> transform_users(options)
end

def filter_users(users, "followers"), do: ....
def filter_users(users, "other"), do: ....
def filter_users(users, _), do: ....

def transform_users(users, nil), do: users
def transform_users(users, opts), do: ....
4 Likes
5

thanks so much @cmkarlsson, you solution help me. I am a former Ruby on Rails developer but now switch to Elixir. It still new to me but it is great in many way

6

No worries. It takes some practice to get used to a more functional way of thinking. something I think we all encountered when we transitioned from traditional procedural/OOP to functional languages.

If your code starts having lots of if/else clauses or other conditionals they can generally be refactored in a more functional way. Remember that in elixir everything is an expression.

1 Like