Code Inspection: Unnecessary 'else' branch

Reports the else branches in if statements whose bodies always execute a terminating statement such as return or throw. Such branches are redundant and can be safely omitted.

In the following example, if the condition evaluates to true, $a is returned and the function execution is immediately terminated. The statement return $b; can only be reached if the condition evaluates to false, so after the quick-fix is applied, the code is simplified by unwrapping the else branch.

                function returnGreater($a, $b) {
                    if ($a >= $b) {
                        return $a;
                    } else {
                        return $b;
                    }
                }
            

                function returnGreater($a, $b) {
                    if ($a >= $b) {
                        return $a;
                    }
                    return $b;
                }
            

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Last modified: 16 July 2021