Control Statements (program flow)

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SharpBASIC has four statements to control the flow of a program. Two of them are the conditional statements if and when. The other two are the loop statements for and loop.

IF statement

An if statement tests a condition and executes the block following if the boolean expression result is true:

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if x > 0
  do
    print(x);
  end

Note the do..end block, which marks the block to be executed following the boolean expression. Unlike many programming languages, SharpBASIC does not have the keyword then.

Multiple if branches are possible with the else keyword.

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if x == 1 do
  ' ..
else if x == 2 do
  ' ..
else if x == 3 do
  ' ..
else do
  ' ..
end

Although two keywords are used for an else if statement, it actually behaves like elseif, so this syntax does not result in nested if-statements. Nested statements are always within do..end blocks:

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if x == 1 do
  ' ..
else do
  if x == 2 do
    ' ..
  end
end

Note that if .. do .. end is called an enclosing or compound statement, just as sub .. do .. end or func .. do .. end.

when statement

The when statement is similar to the if statement, but instead of testing a condition, it compares values by means of one or more is branches:

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when x
  is 1 do
    ' ..
  is 2 do
    ' ..
  is other do
    ' ..
end

As you can see, the when statement is SharpBASIC’s switch statement. As such it supports fall-through, but only when explicitly stated:

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when x
  is 1 do
    x = 2;
    fall;
  is 2 do
    ' ..
end

A mix of values and ranges can be tested per branch:

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when x
  is 1 to 5, 7 do
    ' ..
  is 8 to 10 do
    ' ..
  is other do
    ' ..
end

The when statement can be used to test a range similar to an if statement, for example:

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if a > 0 and a < 10 do
  ' ..
end

when a is 1 to 9 do
  ' ..
end

In this case the when statement is more efficient because it produces less code. It is also possible to do an opposite test:

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when a is not 1 to 9 do
  ' ..
end

Although the when statement tests values rather than conditions, it is possible to test against true or false:

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when true is not a < 10 do ' (if a less than 10 is not true)
   ' ..
end

for statement

The for statement is a fixed loop that executes the specified number of times indicated by the .. to .. range:

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for i = 0 to 9 :++ do
  ' ..
end

The for statement uses an operator that indicates if the iteration is incremental (:++) or decremental (:--). Example of a decremental loop:

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for i = 10 to 1 :-- do
  ' ..
end

loop statement

Next to the for statement SharpBASIC also has a variable loop indicated by the keyword loop:

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loop do
  ' ..
end

In this form the loop would execute forever. Be careful! But SharpBASIC has four control keywords to influence the variable loop. The loop can be made conditional at the beginning:

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loop do
  while n < 10;
  ' ..
  n = n + 1;
end

Likewise, the loop can be made conditional at the end:

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loop do
  n = n + 1;
  ' ..
  until n == 10;
end

Note that the while and until condition statements are inside the do..end block. A condition statement at the beginning must always come before any other statement in a loop do ..end block. Similarly, a condition statement at the end must always be the last statement in a loop do ..end block. Both while and until are allowed at the beginning or at the end. However, only one condition statement is allowed.

break and skip

The other two keywords that control a variable loop are break and skip. The break statement is used to exit a loop at any time. The skip statement is used to skip one or more statements by immediately returning to the beginning of the loop:

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loop do
  n:++;
  ' exit loop if n is 10
  if n == 10 do
    break;
  end
  ' do not print if n is 5
  if n == 5 do
    skip;
  end
  print(n);
end

The break and skip statements can also be used in a for-loop.