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There are a couple of ways you can use IF statements in JavaScript. One is a more traditional way and the other can be viewed as a shorthand method. The traditional IF statement in JavaScript is as follows:

<script type="text/javascript" language="javascript">
var var1 = 10;
var var2 = 5;
var match = null;
if (var1 == var2) {
  match = 'the variables are the same';
} else {
  match = 'the variables are different';
}
</script>

There is another way we can write IF statements. Take a look at the code below:

<script type="text/javascript" language="javascript">
var var1 = 10;
var var2 = 5;
var match = null;
var1 == var2 ? match = 'same' : match = 'different';
</script>

The fourth line of JavaScript within the tags above represent a whole IF... THEN... ELSE... statement. In fact it is the same statement that is written in the first section of code in this article.

It allows for much more concise code but sacrifices a certain amount of readability. Could certainly come in useful though!