Shorthand for if-else statement

Using the ternary :? operator ^[spec].

var hasName = (name === 'true') ? 'Y' :'N';

The ternary operator lets us write shorthand if..else statements exactly like you want.

It looks like:

(name === 'true') - our condition

? - the ternary operator itself

'Y' - the result if the condition evaluates to true

'N' - the result if the condition evaluates to false

So in short (question)?(result if true):(result is false) , as you can see - it returns the value of the expression so we can simply assign it to a variable just like in the example above.

Try this

hasName = name ? 'Y' : 'N';

You can use an object as a map:

  var hasName = ({
        "true"  : "Y",
        "false" : "N"
  })[name];

This also scales nicely for many options

  var hasName = ({
        "true"          : "Y",
        "false"         : "N",
        "fileNotFound"  : "O"
  })[name];

(Bonus point for people getting the reference)

Note: you should use actual booleans instead of the string value "true" for your variables indicating truth values.