do-while

do-while loops are very similar to while loops, except the truth expression is checked at the end of each iteration instead of in the beginning. The main difference from regular while loops is that the first iteration of a do-while loop is guaranteed to run (the truth expression is only checked at the end of the iteration), whereas it's may not necessarily run with a regular while loop (the truth expression is checked at the beginning of each iteration, if it evaluates to FALSE right from the beginning, the loop execution would end immediately).

There is just one syntax for do-while loops:

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<?php

$i = 0;

do {

    echo $i;

} while ($i > 0);
?>

The above loop would run one time exactly, since after the first iteration, when truth expression is checked, it evaluates to FALSE ($i is not bigger than 0) and the loop execution ends.

Advanced C users may be familiar with a different usage of the do-while loop, to allow stopping execution in the middle of code blocks, by encapsulating them with do-while (0), and using the break statement. The following code fragment demonstrates this:

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<?php
do {

    if ($i < 5) {

        echo "i is not big enough";

        break;

    }

    $i *= $factor;

    if ($i < $minimum_limit) {

        break;

    }

   echo "i is ok";


    /* process i */

} while (0);
?>

Don't worry if you don't understand this right away or at all. You can code scripts and even powerful scripts without using this 'feature'.

There is one major difference you should be aware of when using the do--while loop vs. using a simple while loop: And that is when the check condition is made. In a do--while loop, the test condition evaluation is at the end of the loop. This means that the code inside of the loop will iterate once through before the condition is ever evaluated. This is ideal for tasks that need to execute once before a test is made to continue, such as test that is dependant upon the results of the loop. Conversely, a plain while loop evaluates the test condition at the begining of the loop before any execution in the loop block is ever made. If for some reason your test condition evaluates to false at the very start of the loop, none of the code inside your loop will be executed.

do-while

Code Examples / Notes » control_structures.do.while

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