Re: misunderstaning of switch command

Am 24.06.2025 um 10:23 schrieb Mark Summerfield:

I have a switch command which is doing something I don't expect but I
don't understand what I've done wrong. In this example the default is
always executed but I expect the case before that to be executed.
      const UNCOMPRESSED U
     const ZLIB_COMPRESSED Z
     const SAME_AS_PREV =
     set filename somefile.txt
     set action "added"
     set kind Z
     switch $kind {
         $::SAME_AS_PREV { puts "unchanged \"$filename\"" }
         $::UNCOMPRESSED { puts "$action \"$filename\"" }
         $::ZLIB_COMPRESSED { puts "$action \"$filename\" (zlib
compressed)" }
         default { puts "!!!!!!!! UNEXPECTED !!!!!!!!" }
     }
 What am I doing wrong?

Nothing wrong. Tcl is just different, sorry for that.
The "{" always avoids expansion of variables and commands. If you want to use variables in the switch, you have to avoid the "{".
     switch -exact -- $kind [list\
           $::SAME_AS_PREV { puts "unchanged \"$filename\"" }\
           $::UNCOMPRESSED { puts "$action \"$filename\"" }
           $::ZLIB_COMPRESSED { puts "$action \"$filename\" (zlib compressed)" }\
           default { puts "!!!!!!!! UNEXPECTED !!!!!!!!" }\
           ]
Nevertheless, this is no fun on the quoting level (backslashes at the end etc). In addition, you have to take care, when the variable expansion happens. This might be tricky.
I personally would write it like that:
       switch -exact -- $kind {
           = { # SAME_AS_PREV
               puts "unchanged \"$filename\""
           }
           U { # UNCOMPRESSED
               puts "$action \"$filename\""
           }
           Z { # ZLIB_COMPRESSED
               puts "$action \"$filename\" (zlib compressed)"
           }
           default { puts "!!!!!!!! UNEXPECTED !!!!!!!!" }
       }
Harald