Control flow statement for looping
Syntax
Do [ { Until | While } condition ]
[ statement block ]
Loop
or
Do
[ statement block ]
Loop [ { Until | While } condition ]
Description
The
Do statement executes the statements in the following
statement block until/while the
condition, if any, evaluates to true.
If
Until is used, the
Do statement stops repetition of the
statement block when
condition evaluates to true. The
While keyword has opposite effect, stopping the loop if
condition evaluates to false. If both
condition and either
Until or
While are omitted, the
Do statement loops indefinitely.
If an
Exit Do statement is encountered inside the
statement block, the loop is terminated, and execution resumes immediately following the enclosing
Loop statement. If a
Continue Do statement is encountered, the rest of the
statement block is skipped and execution resumes at the
Do statement.
In the first syntax, the
condition is checked when the
Do statement is first encountered, and if the
condition is met, the
statement block will be skipped. In the second syntax,
condition is initially checked
after the
statement block is executed. This means that the
statement block is always guaranteed to execute
at least once.
condition may be any valid expression that evaluates to False (zero) or True (non-zero).
Example
In this example, a
Do loop is used to count the total number of odd numbers from 1 to 10. It will repeat
until it's
n > 10 condition is met:
Dim As Integer n = 1 '' number to check
Dim As Integer total_odd = 0 '' running total of odd numbers
Do Until( n > 10 )
If( ( n Mod 2 ) > 0 ) Then total_odd += 1 '' add to total if n is odd (has remainder from division by 2)
n += 1
Loop
Print "total odd numbers: " ; total_odd '' prints '5'
End 0
Here, an infinite DO loop is used to count the total number of evens. We place the conditional check inside the loop via an
If...Then statement, which exits the loop if and when
n > 10 becomes true:
Dim As Integer n = 1 '' number to check
Dim As Integer total_even = 0 '' running total of even numbers
Do
If( n > 10 ) Then Exit Do '' exit if we've scanned our 10 numbers
If( ( n Mod 2 ) = 0 ) Then total_even += 1 '' add to total if n is even (no remainder from division by 2)
n += 1
Loop
Print "total even numbers: " ; total_even '' prints '5'
End 0
Dialect Differences
- In the -lang qb and -lang fblite dialects, variables declared inside a DO..LOOP block have a function-wide scope as in QB
- In the -lang fb and -lang deprecated dialects, variables declared inside a FOR..NEXT block are visible only inside the block, and can't be accessed outside it.
Differences from QB
See also