Ann wrote:
I have trouble sometimes figuring out where
break and continue go to. Is there some easy
way to figure it out, or a tool?
Break and continue always operate on the most-nested loop that's currently executing. To show an example, let's add some line numbers to some code...
1) while spam: 2) if foo(spam): 3) continue 4) for n in range(spam): 5) if bar(n): 6) break 7) results.append(baz(spam, n)) 8) spam = spam - 1
Now, when this loop runs, when foo(spam) evaluates as True we execute the continue at line 3. At this time, we're running code that's at the loop-nesting level just inside 'while spam' (line 1), so line 1 is the loop statement that's affected by the continue on line 3. If line 3 is triggered, then we skip lines 4-8 and go back to line 1.
If line 3 is *not* triggered, then we enter a for loop at line 4. There's a break at line 6; if this gets triggered, then we look backwards to find the most-current (i.e. most nested) loop, which is now that for loop on line 4. So we break out of that for loop (which comprises lines 4-7), and drop down to line 8.
So, in general, the way to determine how break and continue will affect program flow is to look backwards (up) for the most recent loop statement; the break/continue will be inside that statement's dependent body. Break will drop you down to the next line after the loop body, and continue will bring you back up to the top of the loop body and the start of the next loop iteration.
Jeff Shannon Technician/Programmer Credit International
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