The "multiway branch" construct demonstrates excellent performance characteristics and serves as the optimal solution in this scenario. Traditional if...else if chains appear fundamentally non-optimizable in this manner. It remains to be determined whether pattern matching can facilitate equivalent low-level optimizations.



Regarding string-based switch statements, empirical evidence suggests they can similarly benefit from multiway branch optimization. If this holds true, significant portions of existing codebase containing if...else if... chains could be refactored using switch statements. Furthermore, even routing/dispatch tables might be replaceable with switch constructs - with the added advantage that switch statements avoid CPU pipeline prediction penalties through deterministic jump table implementations.




From an architectural perspective, switch statements may emerge as a prevailing paradigm in future system design, given their combination of performance advantages and maintainability benefits.