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<h3 class="section" id="The-while-Statement-1"><span>10.3 The while Statement<a class="copiable-link" href="#The-while-Statement-1"> ¶</a></span></h3>
<a class="index-entry-id" id="index-while-statement"></a>
<a class="index-entry-id" id="index-endwhile-statement"></a>
<a class="index-entry-id" id="index-loop"></a>
<a class="index-entry-id" id="index-body-of-a-loop"></a>
<p>In programming, a <em class="dfn">loop</em> means a part of a program that is (or at least can
be) executed two or more times in succession.
</p>
<p>The <code class="code">while</code> statement is the simplest looping statement in Octave.
It repeatedly executes a statement as long as a condition is true. As
with the condition in an <code class="code">if</code> statement, the condition in a
<code class="code">while</code> statement is considered true if its value is nonzero, and
false if its value is zero. If the value of the conditional expression
in a <code class="code">while</code> statement is a vector or a matrix, it is considered
true only if it is non-empty and <em class="emph">all</em> of the elements are nonzero.
</p>
<p>Octave’s <code class="code">while</code> statement looks like this:
</p>
<div class="example">
<div class="group"><pre class="example-preformatted">while (<var class="var">condition</var>)
<var class="var">body</var>
endwhile
</pre></div></div>
<p>Here <var class="var">body</var> is a statement or list of statements that we call the
<em class="dfn">body</em> of the loop, and <var class="var">condition</var> is an expression that
controls how long the loop keeps running.
</p>
<p>The first thing the <code class="code">while</code> statement does is test <var class="var">condition</var>.
If <var class="var">condition</var> is true, it executes the statement <var class="var">body</var>. After
<var class="var">body</var> has been executed, <var class="var">condition</var> is tested again, and if it
is still true, <var class="var">body</var> is executed again. This process repeats until
<var class="var">condition</var> is no longer true. If <var class="var">condition</var> is initially
false, the body of the loop is never executed.
</p>
<p>This example creates a variable <code class="code">fib</code> that contains the first ten
elements of the Fibonacci sequence.
</p>
<div class="example">
<div class="group"><pre class="example-preformatted">fib = ones (1, 10);
i = 3;
while (i <= 10)
fib (i) = fib (i-1) + fib (i-2);
i++;
endwhile
</pre></div></div>
<p>Here the body of the loop contains two statements.
</p>
<p>The loop works like this: first, the value of <code class="code">i</code> is set to 3.
Then, the <code class="code">while</code> tests whether <code class="code">i</code> is less than or equal to
10. This is the case when <code class="code">i</code> equals 3, so the value of the
<code class="code">i</code>-th element of <code class="code">fib</code> is set to the sum of the previous two
values in the sequence. Then the <code class="code">i++</code> increments the value of
<code class="code">i</code> and the loop repeats. The loop terminates when <code class="code">i</code>
reaches 11.
</p>
<p>A newline is not required between the condition and the
body; but using one makes the program clearer unless the body is very
simple.
</p>
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