Why you should care

When a function grows in complexity it is not uncommon to use multiple return statements inside the function’s body. However, in order to keep a clear intent and a sustainable readability level, it is preferable to avoid returning meaningful values from many output points in the body.

There are two main cases for returning values in a function: the result of the function return when it has been processed normally, and the error cases that indicate a wrong input parameter or any other reason for the function to not be able to complete its computation or task.

If you do not wish to raise exceptions for the second case, then returning a value, such as None or False, indicating that the function could not perform correctly might be needed. In this case, it is better to return as early as the incorrect context has been detected. It will help to flatten the structure of the function: all the code after the return-because-of-error statement can assume the condition is met to further compute the function’s main result. Having multiple such return statements is often necessary.

Business Impacts

CAST recommendations

References

https://www.tutorialspoint.com/sql/sql-transactions.htm