Switch vs if comparison in Javascript - Hands-On Comparison

Switch vs if comparison

📖 Scenario: Imagine you are building a simple program that tells the day of the week based on a number from 1 to 7. You want to see how to use both switch and if statements to do this.

🎯 Goal: You will create a program that takes a number called dayNumber and prints the name of the day using both switch and if statements. This will help you understand how these two ways of making decisions work.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create a variable dayNumber with the value 3

Create a variable dayNameIf to hold the day name using if statements

Create a variable dayNameSwitch to hold the day name using a switch statement

Print both dayNameIf and dayNameSwitch to compare results

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

Programs often need to make choices based on values, like showing the day name from a number. Knowing both <code>if</code> and <code>switch</code> helps you write clear code.

💼 Career

Understanding decision-making in code is essential for all programming jobs. Using <code>switch</code> or <code>if</code> statements correctly helps you write readable and efficient code.

1

Create the dayNumber variable

Create a variable called dayNumber and set it to the number 3.

Javascript

# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use const dayNumber = 3; to create the variable.

2

Create dayNameIf using if statements

Create a variable called dayNameIf. Use if, else if, and else statements to set dayNameIf to the correct day name for dayNumber. Use these mappings: 1 = 'Monday', 2 = 'Tuesday', 3 = 'Wednesday', 4 = 'Thursday', 5 = 'Friday', 6 = 'Saturday', 7 = 'Sunday'. If the number is not 1 to 7, set dayNameIf to 'Invalid day'.

Javascript

const dayNumber = 3;
// Your code here

Need a hint?

Use if and else if to check dayNumber and assign the correct day name to dayNameIf.

3

Create dayNameSwitch using a switch statement

Create a variable called dayNameSwitch. Use a switch statement on dayNumber to set dayNameSwitch to the correct day name using the same mappings as before. Use a default case to set dayNameSwitch to 'Invalid day' if the number is not 1 to 7.

Javascript

const dayNumber = 3;
let dayNameIf;
if (dayNumber === 1) {
    dayNameIf = 'Monday';
} else if (dayNumber === 2) {
    dayNameIf = 'Tuesday';
} else if (dayNumber === 3) {
    dayNameIf = 'Wednesday';
} else if (dayNumber === 4) {
    dayNameIf = 'Thursday';
} else if (dayNumber === 5) {
    dayNameIf = 'Friday';
} else if (dayNumber === 6) {
    dayNameIf = 'Saturday';
} else if (dayNumber === 7) {
    dayNameIf = 'Sunday';
} else {
    dayNameIf = 'Invalid day';
}
// Your code here

Need a hint?

Use switch (dayNumber) with case for each day number and a default for invalid numbers.

4

Print both dayNameIf and dayNameSwitch

Write two console.log statements to print the values of dayNameIf and dayNameSwitch.

Javascript

const dayNumber = 3;
let dayNameIf;
if (dayNumber === 1) {
    dayNameIf = 'Monday';
} else if (dayNumber === 2) {
    dayNameIf = 'Tuesday';
} else if (dayNumber === 3) {
    dayNameIf = 'Wednesday';
} else if (dayNumber === 4) {
    dayNameIf = 'Thursday';
} else if (dayNumber === 5) {
    dayNameIf = 'Friday';
} else if (dayNumber === 6) {
    dayNameIf = 'Saturday';
} else if (dayNumber === 7) {
    dayNameIf = 'Sunday';
} else {
    dayNameIf = 'Invalid day';
}

let dayNameSwitch;
switch (dayNumber) {
    case 1:
        dayNameSwitch = 'Monday';
        break;
    case 2:
        dayNameSwitch = 'Tuesday';
        break;
    case 3:
        dayNameSwitch = 'Wednesday';
        break;
    case 4:
        dayNameSwitch = 'Thursday';
        break;
    case 5:
        dayNameSwitch = 'Friday';
        break;
    case 6:
        dayNameSwitch = 'Saturday';
        break;
    case 7:
        dayNameSwitch = 'Sunday';
        break;
    default:
        dayNameSwitch = 'Invalid day';
}
// Your code here

Need a hint?

Use console.log(dayNameIf); and console.log(dayNameSwitch); to print the results.