Loops

Loops statements are compound statements that make control go around in circles for a while, then exit at the end of the loop.

While loop

The simplest loop, repeatedly executes its body whilst its condition is true. If the condition is initially false, the body is not executed. On exit, the statement following the loop is executed.

var x = 10;
while x > 0 do
  println$ x;
  x = x - 1;
done
println$ "Done";

A semicolon is not required after the done. Make sure when writing while loops that the condition eventually becomes false, unless, of course, you intend an infinite loop.

For loop

For loops feature a control variable which is usually modified each iteration, until a terminal condition is met. The simplest for loop uses a slice:

for i in 0..<3 do
  println$ i;
done

Here, we print the variable i, which is initially 0, and takes on the values 1,2 as well before the loop terminates. The slice used indicates it is exclusive of the last value. An inclusive slice is illustrated here:

for i in 0..3 do
  println$ i;
done

and the loop iterations include the value 3. The values of a the slice start and slice end delimiters can be arbitrary expressions of type int. Slices can be empty if the end is lower than the start, in this case the loop body is not executed.

The control variable, i above, is automatically defined and goes out of scope at the end of the loop. It should not be modified during the iteration.