Conditions to Expressions

[Mwexim]

Description

We had it long enough: conditions. Why are they a separate syntax element? Why do conditions in Skript work like this? They are definitely limiting certain approaches that are easy to do in Java.

I don't know if it is suggested already, but I thought it was weird that this didn't change. Why do we have Conditions? Why aren't they integrated as Expressions that return a boolean? Why?

Just to give an example from the skript-parser project: click. It works like an Expression, but it uses a certain use case of it (ConditionalExpression). If you go to the ConditionalExpression class, it is actually just a sort of utility class that extends Expression\<Boolean>.

Apart from that, conditions work also different in that repository. Instead of the conditions being syntax, it works like if %boolean%; else if %boolean%; else. This is Java-like and much more convenient.

Pros:

• You can create expressions like not %boolean%, %boolean% and %boolean%, and %boolean% or %boolean%, to mimic the Java operators (!, && and ||) that aren't limited.

• When you change the system and convert the current conditions into ConditionalExpressions, it won't break any Skript, since the syntax stays the same, but the conditions just work differently.

• Easy use cases like if true and while true become a thing (maybe this was already supported).

• You can use Conditions like expressions, for example: return {var} is 20. This means that the expression to evaluate conditions can be removed.

Cons:

I literally cannot find anything aside from the massive work it will take. Not a difficult job, but a time-consuming one.

Please let me know if I overlooked something, because I'm not one of the contributors here, so I don't know how the structure of Skript works 100%. It can be impossible or maybe it is already integrated in some way I didn't see.

[Moderocky]

Already suggested nearly a year ago - https://github.com/SkriptLang/Skript/issues/2207

No idea what happened about it. 😦

[Mwexim]

Already suggested nearly a year ago - #2207

No idea what happened about it. 😦

Sorry, should've done my research. But I think it's good we can finally talk about this. It's something that was in my mind for a long time and especially since I began digging in the skript-parser repository, it came to my mind even more.

This needs to get done imo. Skript currently is such a mess and instead of adding syntax, it should get cleaned up as well. I think the next thing is to loosen the integration with BukkitAPI to enable easier integration with other plugins.

[ShaneBeee]

duplicate of #2207