>Hi Jim,
>
>SET SOAPBOX ON
>SET BAD MEMORIES ON
>
>
>I ***ABSOLUTELY SUBSCRIBE*** to the "one exit point" approach, and *ALL* my code follows this.
>
>Why? Simple answer -- because someone besides myself might have to read AND understand my code one day.

Hi Evan,

While I sympathize with you, I have to disagree IF you imply that a single exit point ALWAYS gives more readable code. If the programmer is forced to adhere to a 'single exit point' standard, then there will occasionally be many IF constructions, not only causing multiple indents, but also forcing the reader to browse to the ELSE section in order to understand what's happening. The reader/programmer will have to do a lot of page-browsing up and down, which will not improve understanding. One can only hope that the 'negative' condition (the condition that should directly lead to the door) is dealt with first in the IF and the positive condition is handles in the ELSE. Compare:

IF <value found>
   IF <some other value found>
      <real code>
      ...
      ...
      ...
      ...
      ...
   ELSE
      * quit this function
   ENDIF
ELSE
   * quit this function
ENDIF

IF <value not found>
   * quit this function
ELSE
   IF <some other value not found>
      * quit this function
   ELSE  
      <real code>
      ...
      ...
      ...
      ...
      ...
   ENDIF
ENDIF

There's another problem, valid for both examples. Suppose that 'value not found' should indeed directly lead to the door, the risk of coding like above is that in time this will not be the case. Another programmer might put some code at a place that breaks the direct path to the door, like in:

IF <value found>
   IF <some other value found>
      <real code>
      ...
      ...
      ...
      ...
      ...
   ELSE
      * quit this function
   ENDIF
   < code added by some other programmer >
ELSE
   * quit this function
ENDIF