break; vs continue; vs return;

Question

I downloaded a free newsletter written in php from hotscripts.com

I updated a little the code to add new functionality and I saw something I don't understand.

In the code I see:

foreach() { ...  if() ...   break;  elseif() ...   continue; } 

I also saw:

function() { // ... for($nl = 0; ...  if() ...   return true; } 

I read that break; will stop the loop, continue will skip the loop to the next iteration and return will exit the function.

What I don't understand is why coding that style? Why not use something like:

function() { // ...  for($nl = 0; ...   if() ...    $returnValue = true;   else {    $returnValue = false;   }  }  return $returnValue; } 

or same idea in the for loops?

Answer 1

Using keywords such as break and continue can make the code far easier to read than what you propose.

Especially if you are nesting if/else-statements more than one level.

Compare the snippets further down in this post, which one is easier to read? Both of them output the same exact thing, and $A is array (1,2,4,4,3,4).

A return in a loop (inside a function) can save precious CPU cycles, if you know you don't need to loop any further, why do it?

---

I'm too cool to use break/continue..

$not_even_found = false;  foreach ($A as $v) {   if ($v != 1) {     if ($not_even_found) {     } else if ($v % 2 != 0) {       $not_even_found = true;     } else {       echo "$v\n";     }   } } 

---

I want to have readable code..

foreach ($A as $v) {   if ($v == 1)     continue;    if ($v % 2 != 0)     break;    echo "$v\n"; }