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That's 10 minutes where I could be... you know, living my life, man. Everybody knows what + does. You don't have to teach a high schooler that "if A or B" means "if either A or B is true". They just get it. But what the heck does "if A || B {}" mean?



Actually, you do have to teach most high schoolers (actually most people) what "A or B" means. The common usage reads that as "A xor B"


A very good point. I still think it's a big win if it makes it 1% easier for new programmers to understand.


I actually think "and" and "or" make it 1% more difficult for new programmers because it doesn't implicitly warn them about things like short-circuit evaluation and whatnot. "and" and "or" have a lot of nuances that experienced programmers take for granted that a new programmer won't know until they're taught.




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