Using break

In Java, the break statement has three uses.

• As you have seen it terminates a statement sequence in a switch statement.
• It can be used to exit a loop.
• It can be used as a “civilized” form of goto.

The last two uses are explained here.

Using break to Exit a Loop By using break you can force immediate termination of a loop by-passing the conditional expression and any remaining code in the body of the loop.

When a break statement is encountered inside a loop, the loop is terminated and program control resumes at the next statement following the loop. Here is a simple example:

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// Using break to exit a loop. class WLBreak { public static void main(String args[]) { for(int i=0; i<10; i++) { if(i == 5) break; // terminate loop if i is 10 System.out.println("i: " + i); } System.out.println("Loop complete."); } }

Type following command in command prompt

javac WLBreak.java

java WLBreak

 

i: 0

i: 1

i: 2

i: 3

i: 4

Loop complete.

Here are two other points to remember about break. First, more than one break statement may appear in a loop. However, be careful. Too many break statements have the tendency to de-structure your code. Second, the break that terminates a switch statement affects only that switch statement and not any enclosing loops.

REMEMBER break was not designed to provide the normal means by which a loop is terminated. The loop’s conditional expression serves this purpose. The break statement should be used to cancel a loop only when some sort of special situation occurs.