I'm refactoring a large javascript document that I picked up from an open source project. A number of functions use inconsistent return statements. Here's a simple example of what I mean:
var func = function(param) { if (!param) { return; } // do stuff return true;}Sometimes the functions return boolean, sometimes strings or other things. Usually they are inconsistently paired with a simple return; statement inside of a conditional.
The problem is that the code is complex. It is a parser that uses a multitude of unique RegEx matches, creates and destroys DOM nodes on the fly, etc. Preliminary testing shows that, in the above example, I could change the return; statement to become return false;, but I'm concerned that I may not realize that it had a negative impact (i.e. some feature stopped working) on the script until much later.
So my questions: Is there a benefit to using a blank return statement? Could this have been intentionally coded this way or was it just lazy? Can I change them all to return false;, or return null; or do I need to dig through every call and find out what they are doing with the results of those functions?