Flow Control

A decision structure is intended for conditional execution. It is designed to change program flow by selecting a new path from among one or more possible branch points. PxPlus includes the following directives for building decision structures:

IF..THEN..ELSE

Use an IF ..THEN statement to execute a series of statements based on the result of a Boolean expression that evaluates to true (non-zero). An optional ELSE clause can be used to specify statements that are to be executed when the Boolean expression evaluates to false.

IF expression THEN ... [ELSE... ] [ END_IF ]

All statements within an IF..THEN..ELSE structure exist on the same line and must be separated by semi-colons. However, statements can span multiple lines if they are enclosed within curly brackets.

IF expression THEN { ...} [ELSE { ...} ] [ END_IF ]

An optional END_IF (or FI) clause may be used as an IF terminator and/or to execute a common closing statement that is outside the IF condition. This is particularly useful for separating ELSE clauses within a nested IF..THEN..ELSE structure. Once the statements that follow an END_IF clause are executed, control falls through to the next line or (if nested) to the previous layer of IF..THEN..ELSE.

Example:

These example IF..THEN..ELSE statements perform similar operations. The one on the right uses curly brackets to separate statements on different lines.

For syntax details, see IF..THEN..ELSE directive.

As an alternative to a compound IF..THEN..ELSE statement, use SWITCH..CASE.

SWITCH..CASE

The SWITCH..CASE directive executes different statements, depending on where it finds a match among a series of values. Unlike the IF..THEN..ELSE structure, which chooses between two possible branch points, this structure chooses from multiple branch points:

SWITCH expression CASE range_1 [ ... CASE range_n ] [ BREAK ] [ DEFAULT ] ... END SWITCH

Execution continues with the statements that follow any matching CASE range (until the next BREAK or END SWITCH). If there are no matches in any of the CASE statements, control falls through to the DEFAULT clause (if present), and the statements that follow are executed automatically.

Example:

SWITCH UCS(x$)
CASE "CAT"
PRINT "Selected cat"
BREAK
CASE "DOG","FOX","PIG"
PRINT "Selected ",x$
BREAK
CASE >"ZEBRA"
PRINT "Selected something Greater than a Zebra"
BREAK
DEFAULT
PRINT "Default code kicks in"
! This executes when all of the above fails
END SWITCH

This can be coded similarly using the following IF..THEN..ELSE statement:

IF x$="CAT" \
THEN PRINT "Selected cat" \
ELSE IF x$="DOG" OR x$="FOX" OR x$="PIG" \
THEN PRINT "Selected ",x$ \
ELSE IF x$>"ZEBRA" \
THEN PRINT "Selected something Greater than a Zebra" \
ELSE PRINT "Default code kicks in"
! This executes when all of the above fails

For syntax details, see SWITCH..CASE directive.

ON..GOSUB / ON..GOTO

These statements provide a variation of the GOTO and GOSUB directives that allow transfer of control to a choice of multiple destinations.

ON num GOSUB stmtref,stmtref,...
ON num GOTO stmtref,stmtref,...

In this decision structure, the branch point is determined by counting num places through the sequence of stmtrefs. The sequence is 0 (zero) based. If num is greater than the number of stmtrefs supplied, the last stmtref is assumed. If num is 0 or less, the first stmtref is assumed.

Example:

1000 ON X GOSUB 2100,2200,2200,2300

If X = 0, control transfers to line 2100. If X = 1, control transfers to line 2200 and so on.

For syntax details, see ON ... GOSUB / GOTO directive.