Hi, why do we use the break and continue structure?

Question

Hi, I was wondering why do we use the break and continue structure in some program such as:
for ( int i = 1; i <= 10; i++ ) {
if ( i == 5 )
break;
So, now why do we use those codes, instead of achiving the same results by not using the if structure.
I am new in java so I can be totaly wrong that is why my question come to you guys.
I will appriciate if you let me understand more.

Answer 1

I may not completely understand your question, but - imagine the following scenario:
// Looking for some value in a long, unsorted list
Object target = null;
int index = -1;
for (int i = 0; i < list.size(); i++) {
    Object curObject = list.get(i);
    if (curObject.equals(source)) {
        target = source;
        index = i;
if (target != null){
    System.out.println("Found it at " + index);
}You will always run through the entire long list, even if the thing you are looking for is the first thing in the list. By inserting a break statement as:
// Looking for some value in a long, unsorted list
Object target = null;
int index = -1;
for (int i = 0; i < list.size(); i++) {
    Object curObject = list.get(i);
    if (curObject.equals(source)) {
        target = source;
        index = i;
        break;
if (target != null){
    System.out.println("Found it at " + index);
}You can skip whatever's left in the list.
As for continue, yes, I suppose you could use a big if, but that can get burdensome - you end up with code like:
for (int i = 0; i < list.size(); i++) {
    Object curObject = list.get(i);
    // you want to do the rest only if some condition holds
    if (someCondition) {
        // do some stuff -
        // And you end up with lots of code
        // all in this if statement thing
        // which is ok, I suppose
        // but harder to read, in my opinion, than the
        // alternative
}instead of
for (int i = 0; i < list.size(); i++) {
    Object curObject = list.get(i);
    // you want to do the rest only if some condition holds
    if (!someCondition) {
        continue;
    // do some stuff -
    // And you end up with lots of code
    // all outside of any if statement thing
    // which is easier to read, in my opinion, than the
    // alternative
}Hope that helped
Lee