Thinking there's an easier way to do this?

Hi Tommaso,

I think your first code block would be about what is expected of you based on what is taught in the course. Jeff Busch has shown you how to remove the repetition by using the logical OR operator ||

A further simplification could be to drop the else clause.

function arrayCounter(array) {
    if (typeof array === "string" || typeof array === "number" || typeof array === "undefined") {
        return 0;
    }

    return array.length;
}

This is what the code challenge wanted. Either your answer or the simplified one from Jeff. This function has problems though. We could pass in a boolean, or an object, or a function and it would attempt to return the length of them.

You had the right idea for a more robust solution with your second code block. Rather than use typeof which doesn't work there is the Array.isArray() method. This returns true if the object passed in is an array, false otherwise.

function arrayCounter(array) {
    if (Array.isArray(array)) {
        return array.length;
    }

    return 0; // It must not have been an array so return 0
}

This would be more robust but beyond the scope of the course I think. Even this function though has a problem which also exists in the more lengthy solution. What if an empty array is passed in? It's going to return 0. The same thing you return when it's not an array. So you won't be able to tell the difference between these 2.

A better second return value might be -1. Arrays can't have a negative length so if it does return a negative 1 then you know it wasn't an array. If it returns a 0 then you know it was an array whose length was zero.