Condition Similar Block

ID

php.condition_similar_block

Severity

low

Remediation Complexity

trivial

Remediation Risk

low

Remediation Effort

low

Resource

Reliability

Language

Php

Tags

duplicate-branch, reliability

Description

Reports an if / elseif / else chain in which two branches have identical bodies. When two branches run exactly the same code, the condition that selects between them has no observable effect, which is almost always a copy-paste mistake.

Rationale

If two branches of a conditional are identical, then either the wrong block was duplicated when the chain was written, or one branch was never updated after copying. Both cases hide a real bug: the author intended the branches to differ. Collapsing or correcting the duplicate makes the true control flow explicit.

<?php
if ($kind === 'a') {        // FLAW — both branches return the same thing
    return handle($code);
} else {
    return handle($code);
}

if ($kind === 'a') {        // OK — branches differ
    return handle($code);
} else {
    return fallback($code);
}

Remediation

If the branches are genuinely meant to be the same, remove the redundant condition and keep a single unconditional statement. Otherwise, fix the branch that was copied incorrectly so the bodies differ as intended.

References