What's the difference between switches and conditionals? [duplicate]

This question already has answers here: Closed 11 years ago.

Possible Duplicate:

When to use If-else if-else over switch statments and vice versa

I'm sure they're fundamentally very different things, but in practical use I've never found a case where there's been any difference between

switch (value){
    case 1:
        //Do stuff
        break;
    case 2:
        //Do other stuff
        break;
}

and

if (value == true){
    //Do stuff
}
else{
    //D开发者_如何学运维o other stuff
}

What are some example scenarios where one is more appropriate than the other? How, conceptually, are the different? Are there performance of semantics advantages?

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They are analogous, but not equivalent. The switch/case statement is generally used when deciding what routine to invoke given a particular integer, and is commonly employed for checking an enum. For these cases, it may be more expressive and more readable to use a switch.

The if/else evaluates a boolean expression.