PHP Coding styles return; in switch/case

Question

we're trying to implement new coding style guidelines for our team, the php codesniffer is printing an warning on switch case statements when no "break" is found like:

switch ($foo) {        case 1:       return 1;        case 2:       return 2;       default:        return 3;  } 

is there any good reason to use :

   switch ($foo) {        case 1:          return 1;          break;    } 

?? the break is never reached ?

Answer 1

It's perfectly valid to leave out the break when you return from a switch.

But it's fairly common practise to add explicit breaks to every case as a defensive programming practise.

switch ($foo) {     case 1:         return 1;         break;      case 2:         return 2;         break; } 

The idea is that should you later change your code in case 1 and remove the return statement, you could forget to add a break.

That would accidentally cause program flow to fall through to case 2.

switch ($foo) {     case 1:         somethingDifferent();      case 2:         return 2;         break; } 

Falling through case statements is slightly unusual and you should add a comment to your code when you do it to show that it's intentional.

switch ($foo) {     case 1:         somethingDifferentAndWeWantToDoCase2AsWell();         // fallthrough      case 2:         return 2;         break; } 

As with many defensive programming practises you've got to balance whether the code bloat - which potentially clutters your code and make it less readable - is worth it or not.