[pizza234]

Specifically to Ruby (therefore, this is not a generic answer), switch/case has syntax for "short form" expressions, that make the conditionals very coincise, by requiring only the variable part of what would otherwise be, repeating whole expressions.

Making an example is simpler than formulating a defition :-):

  case instance
  when MyClass...
  when MyOtherClass...
  ...
  end

which would otherwise be:

  if instance.is_a?(MyClass)
    ...
  elif instance.is_a?(MyOtherClass)
    ...
  ...
  end

if you consider that this has support for many other expressions (regular expressions, ranges...), you'll see a very coincise construct for the purpose.