Command-query Separation

Command-query Separation

Command-query separation (CQS) is a principle of imperative computer programming. It was devised by Bertrand Meyer as part of his pioneering work on the Eiffel programming language.

It states that every method should either be a command that performs an action, or a query that returns data to the caller, but not both. In other words, asking a question should not change the answer. More formally, methods should return a value only if they are referentially transparent and hence possess no side effects. It is noteworthy that rigid implementation of this specification makes tracking the number of times queries have been issued essentially impossible; it is clearly intended as a programming guideline rather than a rule for good coding, such as avoiding the use of a goto from a nested loop.