Elsevaries

Elsevaries is a term used in discussions of conditional evaluation in programming language theory to denote situations where the result of the else branch is not fixed across executions or contexts. It highlights cases in which taking the else path can yield different outcomes due to external state, non-deterministic inputs, or varying evaluation strategies.

The term is not part of formal language syntax or standard nomenclature; rather, it is a descriptive label that appears in some theoretical writings and commentaries to draw attention to variability in conditional behavior. It is used to illustrate how the otherwise branch can influence observable results beyond the simple boolean condition.

Examples of elsevaries arise in scenarios where the else clause invokes functions with side effects, or depends on time-varying data, causing the else outcome to differ between runs. In lazy or non-strict languages, deferred computations within the else branch may interact with mutable state in ways that yield different results on repeated evaluations, even when the condition remains the same.

Relation to related ideas includes non-determinism, side effects, and evaluation strategies. Elsevaries is often discussed to argue for clearer semantics or more deterministic design in languages that allow varied evaluation orders or observable side effects in conditional constructs. See also related concepts such as non-determinism and conditional expressions.