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19 Statements

A statement specifies computations to be done for effect; it does not produce a value, as an expression would. In general a statement ends with a semicolon (‘;’), but blocks (which are statements, more or less) are an exception to that rule. See Blocks.

The places to use statements are inside a block, and inside a complex statement. A complex statement contains one or two components that are nested statements. Each such component must consist of one and only one statement. The way to put multiple statements in such a component is to group them into a block (see Blocks), which counts as one statement.

The following sections describe the various kinds of statement.

• Expression Statement
• if Statement
• if-else Statement
• Blocks
• return Statement
• Loop Statements
• switch Statement
• Example of switch
• Duff’s Device
• Case Ranges
• Null Statement
• goto Statement and Labels
• Locally Declared Labels
• Labels as Values
• Statements and Declarations in Expressions