Control flow · A Byte of Python https://python.swaroopch.com/control_flow.

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Control Flow
In the programs we have seen till now, there has always been a series of
statements faithfully executed by Python in exact top-down order. What if you
wanted to change the flow of how it works? For example, you want the program
to take some decisions and do different things depending on different situations,
such as printing 'Good Morning' or 'Good Evening' depending on the time of the
day?

As you might have guessed, this is achieved using control flow statements. There
are three control flow statements in Python - if , for and while .

The if statement

The if statement is used to check a condition: if the condition is true, we run a

block of statements (called the if-block), else we process another block of
statements (called the else-block). The else clause is optional.

Example (save as if.py ):

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number = 23

guess = int(input('Enter an integer : '))

if guess == number:

# New block starts here

print('Congratulations, you guessed it.')

print('(but you do not win any prizes!)')

# New block ends here

elif guess < number:

# Another block
print('No, it is a little higher than that')
# You can do whatever you want in a block ...

else:
print('No, it is a little lower than that')
# you must have guessed > number to reach here

print('Done')

# This last statement is always executed,

# after the if statement is executed.

Output:

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$ python if.py

Enter an integer : 50
No, it is a little lower than that

Done

$ python if.py

Enter an integer : 22
No, it is a little higher than that

Done

$ python if.py
Enter an integer : 23

Congratulations, you guessed it.

(but you do not win any prizes!)
Done

How It Works

In this program, we take guesses from the user and check if it is the number that
we have. We set the variable number to any integer we want, say 23 . Then, we
take the user's guess using the input() function. Functions are just reusable pieces
of programs. We'll read more about them in the next chapter.

We supply a string to the built-in input function which prints it to the screen and
waits for input from the user. Once we enter something and press kbd:[enter] key,
the input() function returns what we entered, as a string. We then convert this
string to an integer using int and then store it in the variable guess . Actually, the
int is a class but all you need to know right now is that you can use it to convert a
string to an integer (assuming the string contains a valid integer in the text).

Next, we compare the guess of the user with the number we have chosen. If they
are equal, we print a success message. Notice that we use indentation levels to
tell Python which statements belong to which block. This is why indentation is so
important in Python. I hope you are sticking to the "consistent indentation" rule.
Are you?

Notice how the if statement contains a colon at the end - we are indicating to
Python that a block of statements follows.

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Then, we check if the guess is less than the number, and if so, we inform the user
that they must guess a little higher than that. What we have used here is the elif
clause which actually combines two related if else-if else statements into one
combined if-elif-else statement. This makes the program easier and reduces the
amount of indentation required.

The elif and else statements must also have a colon at the end of the logical line
followed by their corresponding block of statements (with proper indentation, of
course)

You can have another if statement inside the if-block of an if statement and so
on - this is called a nested if statement.

Remember that the elif and else parts are optional. A minimal valid if statement
is:

if True:
print('Yes, it is true')

After Python has finished executing the complete if statement along with the
associated elif and else clauses, it moves on to the next statement in the block
containing the if statement. In this case, it is the main block (where execution of
the program starts), and the next statement is the print('Done') statement. After
this, Python sees the ends of the program and simply finishes up.

Even though this is a very simple program, I have been pointing out a lot of things
that you should notice. All these are pretty straightforward (and surprisingly
simple for those of you from C/C++ backgrounds). You will need to become aware
of all these things initially, but after some practice you will become comfortable
with them, and it will all feel 'natural' to you.

Note for C/C++ Programmers

There is no switch statement in Python. You can use an if..elif..else statement

to do the same thing (and in some cases, use a dictionary to do it quickly)

The while Statement

The while statement allows you to repeatedly execute a block of statements as

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long as a condition is true. A while statement is an example of what is called a

looping statement. A while statement can have an optional else clause.

Example (save as while.py ):

number = 23
running = True

while running:

guess = int(input('Enter an integer : '))

if guess == number:
print('Congratulations, you guessed it.')

# this causes the while loop to stop

running = False
elif guess < number:
print('No, it is a little higher than that.')
else:

print('No, it is a little lower than that.')

else:
print('The while loop is over.')
# Do anything else you want to do here

print('Done')

Output:

$ python while.py
Enter an integer : 50

No, it is a little lower than that.

Enter an integer : 22

No, it is a little higher than that.

Enter an integer : 23
Congratulations, you guessed it.

The while loop is over.

Done

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How It Works

In this program, we are still playing the guessing game, but the advantage is that
the user is allowed to keep guessing until he guesses correctly - there is no need
to repeatedly run the program for each guess, as we have done in the previous
section. This aptly demonstrates the use of the while statement.

We move the input and if statements to inside the while loop and set the
variable running to True before the while loop. First, we check if the variable
running is True and then proceed to execute the corresponding while-block. After
this block is executed, the condition is again checked which in this case is the
running variable. If it is true, we execute the while-block again, else we continue

to execute the optional else-block and then continue to the next statement.

The else block is executed when the while loop condition becomes False - this
may even be the first time that the condition is checked. If there is an else clause
for a while loop, it is always executed unless you break out of the loop with a
break statement.

The True and False are called Boolean types and you can consider them to be
equivalent to the value 1 and 0 respectively.

Note for C/C++ Programmers

Remember that you can have an else clause for the while loop.

The for loop

The for..in statement is another looping statement which iterates over a sequence
of objects i.e. go through each item in a sequence. We will see more about
sequences in detail in later chapters. What you need to know right now is that a
sequence is just an ordered collection of items.

Example (save as for.py ):

for i in range(1, 5):

print(i)
else:

print('The for loop is over')

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Output:

$ python for.py

2
3

4
The for loop is over

How It Works

In this program, we are printing a sequence of numbers. We generate this

sequence of numbers using the built-in range function.

What we do here is supply it two numbers and range returns a sequence of

numbers starting from the first number and up to the second number. For
example, range(1,5) gives the sequence [1, 2, 3, 4] . By default, range takes a step
count of 1. If we supply a third number to range , then that becomes the step
count. For example, range(1,5,2) gives [1,3] . Remember that the range extends up
to the second number i.e. it does not include the second number.

Note that range() generates only one number at a time, if you want the full list of
numbers, call list() on the range() , for example, list(range(5)) will result in [0, 1, 2, 3,
4] . Lists are explained in the data structures chapter.

The for loop then iterates over this range - for i in range(1,5) is equivalent to for i in
[1, 2, 3, 4] which is like assigning each number (or object) in the sequence to i, one
at a time, and then executing the block of statements for each value of i . In this
case, we just print the value in the block of statements.

Remember that the else part is optional. When included, it is always executed
once after the for loop is over unless a break statement is encountered.

Remember that the for..in loop works for any sequence. Here, we have a list of
numbers generated by the built-in range function, but in general we can use any
kind of sequence of any kind of objects! We will explore this idea in detail in later
chapters.

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Note for C/C++/Java/C# Programmers

The Python for loop is radically different from the C/C++ for loop. C#
programmers will note that the for loop in Python is similar to the foreach
loop in C#. Java programmers will note that the same is similar to for (int i :
IntArray) in Java 1.5.

In C/C++, if you want to write for (int i = 0; i < 5; i++) , then in Python you write just
for i in range(0,5) . As you can see, the for loop is simpler, more expressive and
less error prone in Python.

The break Statement

The break statement is used to break out of a loop statement i.e. stop the
execution of a looping statement, even if the loop condition has not become
False or the sequence of items has not been completely iterated over.

An important note is that if you break out of a for or while loop, any
corresponding loop else block is not executed.

Example (save as break.py ):

while True:
s = input('Enter something : ')
if s == 'quit':

break
print('Length of the string is', len(s))

print('Done')

Output:

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$ python break.py

Enter something : Programming is fun

Length of the string is 18

Enter something : When the work is done

Length of the string is 21
Enter something : if you wanna make your work also fun:

Length of the string is 37

Enter something : use Python!

Length of the string is 11

Enter something : quit
Done

How It Works

In this program, we repeatedly take the user's input and print the length of each
input each time. We are providing a special condition to stop the program by
checking if the user input is 'quit' . We stop the program by breaking out of the
loop and reach the end of the program.

The length of the input string can be found out using the built-in len function.

Remember that the break statement can be used with the for loop as well.

Swaroop's Poetic Python

The input I have used here is a mini poem I have written:

Programming is fun

When the work is done

if you wanna make your work also fun:

use Python!

The continue Statement

The continue statement is used to tell Python to skip the rest of the statements in
the current loop block and to continue to the next iteration of the loop.

Example (save as continue.py ):

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while True:

s = input('Enter something : ')

if s == 'quit':

break

if len(s) < 3:
print('Too small')

continue
print('Input is of sufficient length')

# Do other kinds of processing here...

Output:

$ python continue.py

Enter something : a
Too small
Enter something : 12
Too small
Enter something : abc

Input is of sufficient length

Enter something : quit

How It Works

In this program, we accept input from the user, but we process the input string
only if it is at least 3 characters long. So, we use the built-in len function to get
the length and if the length is less than 3, we skip the rest of the statements in
the block by using the continue statement. Otherwise, the rest of the statements
in the loop are executed, doing any kind of processing we want to do here.

Note that the continue statement works with the for loop as well.

Summary

We have seen how to use the three control flow statements - if , while and for
along with their associated break and continue statements. These are some of the
most commonly used parts of Python and hence, becoming comfortable with

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them is essential.

Next, we will see how to create and use functions.

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