What are you trying to achieve?
Perhaps the community can help me create this dictionary for myself and for others coming from a coding environment to a no-code environment like Make.
I’ve been trying to create scenarios and often find myself thinking “If this were just code it would be so much easier, I’d just use a (INSERT CODING SCENARIO HERE) and move on”
So here is a list of common coding sentences. I’d love if the community could help me fill this out with how to do the same thing in Make.
Control Flow Statements
These define logic and flow in most programming languages:
Conditionals
IF [condition] THEN [do something]
IF [condition] THEN [A] ELSE [B]
SWITCH [variable] { CASE A: …, CASE B: … }
TERNARY: [condition] ? [true value] : [false value]
Loops
WHILE [condition] { [do something] }
DO { [action] } WHILE [condition]
FOR [init; condition; increment] { [loop body] }
FOR EACH item IN collection { [process item] }
BREAK → exit loop
CONTINUE → skip to next iteration
Data Structures / Algorithms
Lists / Arrays
FOR EACH item IN list: [do something with item]
APPEND item TO list
REMOVE item FROM list
IF item IN list THEN [do something]
SORT list BY [criteria]
Stacks / Queues
PUSH item ONTO stack
POP item FROM stack
ENQUEUE item TO queue
DEQUEUE item FROM queue
PEEK at top of stack / front of queue
Hash Tables / Dictionaries
SET key TO value
GET value FROM key
IF key EXISTS IN dictionary THEN …
ITERATE over keys / values / pairs
Database Queries (SQL)
SELECT [columns] FROM [table] WHERE [condition]
INSERT INTO [table] (columns) VALUES (values)
UPDATE [table] SET [column = value] WHERE [condition]
DELETE FROM [table] WHERE [condition]
JOIN [table1] ON [common_field]
GROUP BY [column] HAVING [aggregate condition]
ORDER BY [column] ASC|DESC
COUNT(*), SUM([column]), AVG(…), MAX(…)
Automation / Scripting Patterns
Make.com, Zapier, or Workflow Builders
IF [field value] CONTAINS “X” THEN [send notification]
REPEAT FOR EACH [bundle/row]
MAP [array] TO [key-value pair]
AGGREGATE all values FROM [collection]
WAIT UNTIL [condition is met]
SET variable TO [result of step X]
APIs / JSON Structures
GET /resource/{id}
POST /resource with { “name”: “value” }
IF response.status == 200 THEN proceed
FOR EACH item IN response.data
SET headers = { “Authorization”: “Bearer X” }
Error Handling / Logging
TRY { do something risky } CATCH { handle error }
LOG error TO console/file
THROW new Error(“Something went wrong”)
ASSERT condition, “error message if false”
Steps taken so far
I know some of these may be module specific but I’m sure we could figure out how to fill this out and be useful. I’ll start with an example:
IF [condition] THEN [do something] - Example - NOTION MODULE - Watch Database Items.
A basic implementation of IF [row changed] THEN [include in bundle to pass on]
IF [condition] THEN [A] ELSE [B] - Example ROUTER MODULE With FILTER.
Routes data in one of x number of directions. With filter you can create an IF THEN ELSE pretty easy. Setup your filter for the [condition]. So you would see ROUTER → Path A (IF [field exists]) then pass data along ELSE move to Path B and so on.
Does this make sense to anyone else but me? Would anyone else find something like this helpful ?