Repetition Control

Structure
CC2 – Introduction to Computer Programming
Repetition Control Structure
• Repetition control structures are also referred to as iterative
structures.
• These are groupings of code which are designed to repeat a set
of related statements.
• This repetition can repeat zero or more times, until some control
value or condition causes the repetition to cease.
Loops
• The most common term to describe repetition control structures
is a loop.
• Loops have two parts:
• Condition – The logic that evaluates a condition.
• Body – This is where the code integral to the loop is located.
Loops
• There are two common types of looping structures that can be
found in an application:
• Pre-test Loop – This type of loop can execute its body a minimum of
zero times, if the initial condition evaluates to False.
• Post-test Loop – This type of loop can execute its body a minimum of
one time even if the initial condition evaluates to False.
Loops
• Pre-test Loop • Post-test Loop
WHILE Loops
Repetition Control Structures
WHILE Loops
• The WHILE statement is a statement in Python that repeatedly
executed a block of statements if a test at the top keeps
evaluating to a true value.
• When the test in the WHILE statement becomes false, control
passes to the statement that follows the WHILE block.
• The effect of this is that the statements in the WHILE block are
executed repeatedly while the test is true.
• If the test is false to begin with, the body never runs.
WHILE Loops
• The WHILE statement consists of a header line with a test
expression, a body of one or more indented statements, and an
optional else that is executed if control exits the loop without a
break statement.
• The general format of the WHILE statement is as follows:
• while <test>: # Loop test/condition
• <statements1> # Loop Body
• else: # Optional else
• <statements2> # Runs if didn’t exit loop with break
WHILE Loops
• An example of how to use the WHILE loop is shown below:
• while True:
• print("An endless loop...") # prints an endless loop of statements
• This sort of behavior in Python and in other languages is
commonly known as an Infinite Loop.
• This means that a loop with continue to run nonstop since no
stop conditions have been set.
WHILE Loops
• You can place a variable as part of the test in a WHILE loop.
• This allows you to assign a value that can stop the loop when it
is no longer needed.
• An example of this is shown here:
• x = True
• while x:
• print("wow!") # prints a single "wow!"
• x = False
WHILE Loops
• You can also make use of conditional statements as the test in
your WHILE loop.
• This will allow you to set a limit on the number of times the
WHILE block will execute based on a given condition.
• An example of this is shown below:
• y=0
• while (y < 5): # Conditional Statement
• print(y)
• y = y + 1 # Increments y to increase it
WHILE Loops
• You can also make use the characteristics of strings as the test
condition in a WHILE loop.
• This is recommended to using a more verbose equivalent (e.g.,
while (x != “”)).
• This is because strings with text count as a True value while
empty strings count as a False value.
WHILE Loops
• You can use string values in your WHILE loops, as shown
below:
• z = "cheese"
• while z:
• print(z, end=' ') # prints cheese heese eese ese se e
• z = z[1:] # removes the first letter in the string
PASS, CONTINUE, BREAK
and ELSE
Repetition Control Structures
PASS, CONTINUE, BREAK and ELSE
• Pass
• Does nothing at all; this is meant to be placeholder
• Continue
• Jumps to the top of the closest enclosing loop (to the loop’s header line)
• Break
• Jumps out of the closest enclosing loop (past the entire loop statement)
• Else
• In loops, this runs if and only if the loop is exited normally (i.e, without
hitting a break)
PASS, CONTINUE, BREAK and ELSE
• If we include the previous statements in our WHILE loop, it will
look something like this:
• while <test1>:
• <statement1>
• if <test2>: break # exits the loop now, skips else
• if <test3>: continue # go to the top of the loop now, to test1
• else:
• <statement2> # run if we didn't hit a "break"
PASS, CONTINUE, BREAK and ELSE
• BREAK and CONTINUE statements can appear anywhere
inside the WHILE loop body.
• They are usually coded further nested in an IF test to act in
response to some condition.
PASS, CONTINUE, BREAK and ELSE
• An example of this is shown here:
• x=0
• while x <= 3:
• print("zoom")
• x += 1
• if x == 2: break # outputs zoom twice because the loop is stopped
• else:
• print("doom") # never executes since it is skipped due to the break
PASS
• The PASS statement is a no-operation placeholder that is used
when the syntax requires a statement, but you don’t have any
code to place.
• The syntax for this is shown below:
• while True:
• pass # does nothing endlessly
PASS
• The PASS statement is like the “None” value for variables.
• This is meant to be a placeholder; you can think if it as a space
“to be filled in later”.
• Additionally, we can't leave the body of a WHILE loop empty,
so we use the PASS statement to fill in the space temporarily.
CONTINUE
• The CONTINUE statement causes an immediate jump to the
top of a loop.
• It can also help you avoid statement nesting.
• The syntax for this is shown below:
• while <test1>:
• <statements>
• if <test2>: continue # go to the top of the loop now, to test1
CONTINUE
• An example of the CONTINUE statement is shown below:
• x = 10
• while x:
• x=x-1 # this decrements the value of x by 1 per loop
• if x % 2 != 0: continue # this makes the loop skip odd numbers
• print(x, end=" ")
• As seen on the example above, the CONTINUE statement
allows you to skip or ignore certain values based on a given
criteria.
BREAK
• The BREAK statement causes an immediate exit from the loop.
• The code that follows in the loop is not executed if the break is
reached, so you can sometimes avoid nesting with this
statement.
• The syntax for this is shown below:
• while <test1>:
• <statements>
• if <test2>: break # exits the loop now
BREAK
• An example of how the BREAK statement is used is shown
below:
• student_list = []
• while True:
• new_name = input("Enter a student name to be added to the list:")
• if new_name == 'stop': break
• student_list.append(new_name)
• print(student_list)
LOOP ELSE
• Loop ELSE provides a way for us to catch the “other” way out
of a loop, without setting and checking flags or conditions.
• The ELSE statement only executes after a for loop terminates by
iterating to completion, or after a while loop terminates by its
conditional expression becoming false.
• The else clause does not execute if the loop terminates some
other way (through a break statement or by raising an
exception).
LOOP ELSE
• An example of how LOOP ELSE is used can be seen here:
• x = 10
• print("Countdown starting!")
• while x:
• print(x) # prints numbers 10 to 1
• x -= 1
• else:
• print("Time is up!") # executes at the end of the loop once x reaches 0
FOR Loop
Repetition Control Structures
FOR Loop
• A FOR loop in Python is used for iterating a sequence (a list, a
tuple, a dictionary, a set, or a string).
• The FOR loop can execute a set of statements, once for each item
in a list, tuple, dictionary, etc.
FOR Loop
• The python FOR loop begins with a header line that specifies an
assignment target, along with the object you want to step
through.
• The header is followed by a block of statements you want to
repeat:
• for <target> in <object>: # Assign object items to target
• <statements> # Repeated loop body: use target
• else:
• <statements> # If we didn't hit a 'break'
FOR Loop
• When Python runs a FOR loop, it assigns the items in the
sequence object to the target one by one and executes the loop
body for each.
• The loop body typically uses the assignment target to refer to
the current item in the sequence.
• The FOR loop also supports an optional ELSE block, which
works the same way it does for the WHILE loop.
FOR Loop
• An example of the FOR loop being used is seen below:
• food = ['eggs', 'rice', 'chicken', 'beef']
• for x in food: # goes through each value in the loop
• print(x, end=' ') # outputs "eggs, rice, chicken, beef"
FOR Loop
• BREAK, CONTINUE, PASS and ELSE can also be used in FOR
loops.
• An example of these statements being used in a FOR loop is seen
below:
• name_list = ['Jim', 'John', 'Joe', 'Jay', 'Juno']
• name_search = input("Please enter a name to search in the list")
• for names in name_list:
• if names == name_search:
• print("Name found!")
• break
• else:
• print("Name not found!")
FOR Loop
• You can also use other sequences in a FOR loop.
• You can for example use strings and tuples.
• An example of these two being used in a FOR loop can be seen
below:
• string_sample = "charger"
• tuple_sample = ("but", "why", "though")

• for x in string_sample: # for loops allow you to iterate each character in a

• for x in tuple_sample: # for loops also allow you to iterate values in a tuple
• print(x, end=" ") # outputs "but why though"
FOR Loop
• You can also iterate through a subsection of lists or tuples.
• This is done by assigning separate variables based on how
many values there are inside each entry in the list or tuple.
• An example of this can be seen below:
• list_sample = [[1,2],[3,4],[5,6]]
• for (a,b) in list_sample: # allows you to assign a variable to each sub list
• print(a,b) # outputs "1 2 \n 3 4 \n 5 6"
FOR Loop
• FOR loops can also be used to iterate through dictionaries.
• You can choose to iterate using just the keys, as seen below:
• dictionary_sample = {"a": 1, "b": 2, "c": 3}
• for key in dictionary_sample:
• print(key) # prints out “a b c”
FOR Loop
• You can also choose to iterate using both the keys and values
for the dictionary, as seen below:
• dictionary_sample = {"a": 1, "b": 2, "c": 3}
• for key, value in dictionary_sample.items(): # we use .items() to return
both keys and values
• print(key, "::", value) # outputs "a :: 1 \n b :: 2 \n c :: 3"
NESTED FOR Loops
Repetition Control Structures
NESTED FOR Loops
• In Python, you can create NESTED loops.
• These are simply loops within loops.
• You can use this to search multiple sets of data in a list.
• NESTED Loops means that multiple loops are running at the
same time, with the outer loop calling the inner loop every time
it iterates.
NESTED FOR Loops
• An example of a NESTED FOR loop is seen below:
• for x in (1, 2, 3):
• for y in (10, 20, 30):
• z=x*y
• print(z)

• Output:
10 20 30 20 40 60 30 60 90
NESTED FOR Loops
• In line with how loops are constructed, the indentation is
important.
• To create a NESTED Loop, you must make sure the inner loop
is indented and in line with the statements in the outer loop.