[Gambas-user] Referencing an array element with boolean

[Patrik Karlsson]

Many years ago when I was programming in Delphi I used to have object
arrays of size 2 and referencing to the element index with true and false.
This was very very useful.

It was possible since false=0 and true=+1.
In Gambas we have false=0 and true=-1.

So now I came up with:
  Dim sMoods As String[] = ["Sad", "Happy"]
  Dim bHappiness As Boolean

  Debug CInt(True), Abs(True), Abs(CInt(True))
  Debug CInt(False), Abs(False), Abs(CInt(False))

  bHappiness = False
  Debug "bHappiness= "; bHappiness; ": " & sMoods[Abs(CInt(bHappiness))]
  Debug "bHappiness= "; bHappiness; ": " & sMoods[If(bHappiness, 1, 0)]

  bHappiness = True
  Debug "bHappiness= "; bHappiness; ": " & sMoods[Abs(CInt(bHappiness))]
  Debug "bHappiness= "; bHappiness; ": " & sMoods[If(bHappiness, 1, 0)]

1. Why is Abs(True) True?

2. Which is fastest, Abs(CInt(... or If(... ? I guess that If(... is more
future proof.

3. I have a "BoolToIndex" function in a library module but I was thinking
if it should not be part of the language, to be able to reference in
a _simple_ way to an array element with a boolean.

/Patrik