[less] How to use if statements in LESS

I'm looking for some kind of if-statement to control the background-color of different div elements.

I have tried the below, but it doesn't compile

@debug: true;

header {
  background-color: (yellow) when (@debug = true);
  #title {
      background-color: (orange) when (@debug = true);
  }
}

article {
  background-color: (red) when (@debug = true);
}

There is a way to use guards for individual (or multiple) attributes.

@debug: true;

header {
    /* guard for attribute */
    & when (@debug = true) {
        background-color: yellow;
    }
    /* guard for nested class */
    #title when (@debug = true) {
        background-color: orange;
    }
}

/* guard for class */
article when (@debug = true) {
    background-color: red;
}

/* and when debug is off: */
article when not (@debug = true) {
    background-color: green;
}

...and with Less 1.7; compiles to:

header {
    background-color: yellow;
}
header #title {
    background-color: orange;
}
article {
    background-color: red;
}

I stumbled over the same question and I've found a solution.

First make sure you upgrade to LESS 1.6 at least. You can use npm for that case.

Now you can use the following mixin:

.if (@condition, @property, @value) when (@condition = true){
     @{property}: @value;
 }

Since LESS 1.6 you are able to pass PropertyNames to Mixins as well. So for example you could just use:

.myHeadline {
   .if(@include-lineHeight,  line-height, '35px');
}

If @include-lineheight resolves to true LESS will print the line-height: 35px and it will skip the mixin if @include-lineheight is not true.

I wrote a mixin for some syntactic sugar ;)
Maybe someone likes this way of writing if-then-else better than using guards

depends on Less 1.7.0

https://github.com/pixelass/more-or-less/blob/master/less/fn/_if.less

Usage:

.if(isnumber(2), {
    .-then(){
        log {
            isnumber: true;
        }
    }
    .-else(){
        log {
            isnumber: false;
        }
    }
});

.if(lightness(#fff) gt (20% * 2), {
    .-then(){
        log {
            is-light: true;
        }
    }
});

using on example from above

.if(@debug, {
    .-then(){
        header {
            background-color: yellow;
            #title {
                background-color: orange;
            }
        }
        article {
            background-color: red;
        }
    }
});