beginner scripting question re: if elsif else

[jhumphreys]

Knowledgeable Monks-

The following if elsif else script should stop and print the associated message if "snowing" is inputted in answer, but it doesn't. Please advise. Thanks, as always, Monks. You guys rock

#!/usr/bin/perl
# walkies.pl
use warnings;
use strict;

print "What's the weather like outside? ";
my $weather = <STDIN>;
print "How hot is it, in degrees Celsius? ";
my $temperature = <STDIN>;
print "And how many emails left to reply to? ";
my $work = <STDIN>;
chomp($weather, $temperature);

if ($weather eq "snowing") {
    print "OK, let's go!\n";
} elsif ($weather eq "raining") {
    print "No way, sorry, I'm staying in.\n";
} elsif ($temperature < 18) {
    print "Too cold for me!\n";
} elsif ($work > 30) {
    print "Sorry - just too busy.\n";
} else {
    print "Well, why not?\n";
}

[kennethk]

My guess is that you mean you want execution to stop before your get to question #2. In order for that to hold, you need to test the value of $weather before your execute your next print. Perhaps you mean something more like:

#!/usr/bin/perl
# walkies.pl
use warnings;
use strict;

print "What's the weather like outside? ";
chomp(my $weather = <STDIN>);
if ($weather eq "snowing") {
    print "OK, let's go!\n";
    exit;
} elsif ($weather eq "raining") {
    print "No way, sorry, I'm staying in.\n";
    exit;
}

print "How hot is it, in degrees Celsius? ";
my $temperature = <STDIN>;
if ($temperature < 18) {
    print "Too cold for me!\n";
    exit;
}

print "And how many emails left to reply to? ";
my $work = <STDIN>;
if ($work > 30) {
    print "Sorry - just too busy.\n";
} else {
    print "Well, why not?\n";
}

If you want to avoid explicit exits, you could do the same thing with nested if-elsif-else's:

#!/usr/bin/perl
# walkies.pl
use warnings;
use strict;

print "What's the weather like outside? ";
chomp(my $weather = <STDIN>);
if ($weather eq "snowing") {
    print "OK, let's go!\n";
} elsif ($weather eq "raining") {
    print "No way, sorry, I'm staying in.\n";
} else {
    print "How hot is it, in degrees Celsius? ";
    my $temperature = <STDIN>;
    if ($temperature < 18) {
        print "Too cold for me!\n";
    } else {
        print "And how many emails left to reply to? ";
        my $work = <STDIN>;
        if ($work > 30) {
            print "Sorry - just too busy.\n";
        } else {
            print "Well, why not?\n";
        }
    }
}

There are a multitude of other ways to do this, but it all comes down to thinking about the logical progression of what you want to accomplish.

[jhumphreys]

kennethk-

Thanks for your reply. So, with if elsif else, if the first condition is true, the whole script still runs anyway (if no exits scripted)?

j.

[Dlamini]

Yes, the first part of your code gathers information from the user, then the second part actually does something with it. The way you have it, it will ask all the questions, and get all the answers from the user BEFORE getting to the if/else section. Once it is in the if/else section, it will do as you suspect -- i.e. if it is snowing, then that satisfies the if condition and therefore the else conditions are skipped.

[runrig]

The input includes the newline character at the end of the string. You either need to remove the newline or your 'eq' needs to account for it.

[BillKSmith]

You must remove the newline from each input before you test it. Use the function chomp.

[live4tech]

Just a note, jhumphreys did chomp the input in the original program:

chomp($weather, $temperature);

Not the syntax I would use (would be more idiomatic and chomp at input as some of the posters did), but nonetheless, the newlines should be gone.