Observe loop control best practices

Gosu provides for(), while(), and do…while() statements for loop control. Guidewire recommends a few best practices for your loop control logic:

Implement conditional operators in loop conditions correctly

As a best practice, Guidewire recommends that you verify the conditional operators in your conditional expressions to be certain that you fully satisfy the requirements for your loop control logic. For example, <, >, or = might need to be <=, >=, or !=.

Interrupt loop execution as early as possible

As a best practice, Guidewire recommends that you interrupt loop execution as early as possible with continue or break commands.

Use break to break out of loop iteration altogether

The break command stops execution of the loop altogether, and program execution proceeds immediately to the code that follows the loop.

The following sample Gosu code breaks out of the loop altogether on the fourth iteration, when i equals 4. 

for (i in 1..10) { 
  if (i == 4) { 
    break        // Break out of the loop on the fourth iteration.
  }

   print("The number is " + i)
}

 print("Stopped printing numbers")

The preceding sample Gosu code produces the following output.

The number is 1
The number is 2
The number is 3
Stopped printing numbers

Notice that the loop stops executing on the fourth iteration, when i equals 4.

Use a continue statement to continue immediately with the next loop iteration

The continue statement stops execution of the current iteration, and the loop continues with its next iteration.

The following sample Gosu code interrupts the fourth iteration, when i equals 4, but the loop continues executing through all remaining iterations. 

for (i in 1..10) {
  if (i == 4) {
    continue     // End the fourth iteration here. 
  }
  
  print("The number is " + i)
}

The preceding sample code produces the following output.

The number is 1
The number is 2
The number is 3
The number is 5
The number is 6
The number is 7
The number is 8
The number is 9
The number is 10

Notice that the loop continues through all nine iterations, but it interrupts the fourth iteration, when i equals 4.