Week 2

SEN 102 Principles

of Programming I
Software Engineering,
Department of Computing Science,
Faculty of Science,
Admiralty University of Nigeria (ADUN),
Delta State.

Lecturer: Bernard Ephraim

Control Structures: Conditional Statements
& Loops
What are Control Structures?
 Control Structures are at the core of programming
logic. They allow a script to react differently depending
on what has already occurred, or based on user input,
and allow the graceful handling of repetitive tasks.
 In PHP, there are two primary types of Control
Structures:
1. Conditional Statements and
2. Control Loops
Conditional Statements
Conditional Statements
 Conditional statements are statements that allow us to
execute a particular block of code once if a condition is met.
 There are different kinds of conditional statement:
1. If statements
2. If…else statements
3. If…elseif…else statements
4. Switch statements
5. Match statement
If statements
 This is the basic form of conditional statements.
 Its usage is based on the common day-to-day usage of if statements in natural
language.
 For instance, you can tell your friend to get a you a bottle of coke if it is chilled.
 In the case above if your friend finds out from the seller that his stock of coke
drink is not chilled, he is obliged not to buy.
 The following syntax is used to infer the if statement in PHP and most
programming languages
if (condition) {
code to be executed if condition is true;
}
 If statements cont’d
 The condition in the example above is the state of the coke drink being child
 Hence we can represent this condition by is_chilled?
if (isChilled){
//get coke
}
 Example
$isChilled = true;
if($isChilled){
echo 'get coke';
}
If…else Statements
 When we critically look at most use-cases of the if statement in natural language an alternative is
usually provided when the condition is not met.
 In our example above, you could ask your friend to get you ice-scream instead of available coke is
not chilled.
 This would be like this in plain English “get me a bottle of coke if it is chilled else get me one bottle
water”.
 Notice the use of else – this is similar in the case of PHP and other programming languages
$isChilled = false;
if($isChilled){
echo 'get coke';
}else{
echo 'get one bottle water';
}
If…elseif…else Statements $isChilled = false;
 What if you have more than one $isBiscuitAvailable=false;
alternative for the chilled coke? if($isChilled){
Then you find yourself telling the
echo 'get coke';
your friend a series of or else if or
else if statement. }elseif($isBiscuitAvailable){
 For example this would tell your echo 'get one bottle water and
friend to get chilled coke or a biscuit';
bottle of water and biscuit if biscuit }else{
is available else candy.
echo 'get candy';
}
If…elseif…else Alternate Syntax Example
 An alternate syntax for the if $a=5;
statement is to replace the opening if ($a == 5):
curly brackets ,{, with colon ,:, and
echo "a equals 5...";
end the if statement with the
endif; and a semi-colon. elseif ($a == 6):
 This can be useful in conditionally echo "a equals 6!!!";
outputting html within php else:
statement
echo "a is neither 5 nor 6";
$a=5;
endif;
<?php if ($a == 5): ?>
A is equal to 5
<?php endif; ?>
Switch
 Its syntax is:  alternative syntax:
 The switch statement is similar to a
series of IF statements on the same switch ($variable) { switch ($variable):
expression.
case 'value': case 'value':
 In many occasions, you may want to
compare the same variable (or # code... # code...
expression) with many different values, break; break;
and execute a different piece of code
depending on which value it equals to. default: default:
 This is exactly what the switch statement # code... # code...
is for.
break; break;
 It is a special case of the if…elseif
statement and often cleaner form of } endswitch;
expression.
  Example
Switch Cont’d
switch (1) {
 In the sample code above, the
variable $variable is compared with case 1:
the values appended to the case echo '1';
statement.
case 2:
 If a match is found the code starts
executing from that point downwards echo '2';
through the whole switch statement. case 3:
echo '3';
}
  Example
Switch Cont’d
switch (1) {
 One use case for this continuous
downward execution of code could case 1:
be when two or more case conditions case 2:
have the same implementation then
stacking the cases together would echo '2 and two';
help prevent repeating yourself }
  Example
Switch Cont’d
switch (1) {
 To prevent this continuous downward
case 1:
execution of code from happening
echo '1';
we use the break statement at the
end of every case block break;
case 2:
echo '2';
break;
case 3:
echo '3';
break;
}
  Example
Switch Cont’d switch (10) {
 When no match is found a default case 1:
block can be defined to be executed echo '1';
according to your need break;
case 2:
echo '2';
break;
case 3:
echo '3';
break;
default:
echo 'default';
break;
}
 $x = 2;
Switch Cont’d switch ($x+1) {
 Both the switch condition and the case 1:
case match can be expressions echo '1';
break;
case 2:
echo '2';
break;
case 3:
echo '3';
break;
default:
echo 'default';
break;
}
Match
 The match expression branches evaluation based on an identity check of a value.
 Similarly to a switch statement, a match expression has a subject expression that is
compared against multiple alternatives.
 Unlike switch, it will evaluate to a value much like ternary expressions.
 Unlike switch, the comparison is an identity check (===) rather than a weak equality
check (==).
 Match expressions are terminated with a semi-colon
 Syntax,
$return_value = match (subject_expression) {
single_conditional_expression => return_expression,
conditional_expression1, conditional_expression2 => return_expression,
};
Match Cont’d
 Example,
$food = 'cake';
$return_value = match ($food) {
'apple' => 'This food is an apple',
'bar' => 'This food is a bar',
'cake' => 'This food is a cake',
};
var_dump($return_value);
Match Cont’d
 The list of options in the matches must be exhaustive.
 The code below will produce an UnhandledMatchError error, since the value of
food equal to beans does not exist in the match list
$food = 'beans';
$return_value = match ($food) {
'apple' => 'This food is an apple',
'bar' => 'This food is a bar',
'cake' => 'This food is a cake',
};
var_dump($return_value);
Match Cont’d
 To solve this problem, just as in the switch statement use the default statement
to handle no matched cases.
$food = 'beans';
$return_value = match ($food) {
'apple' => 'This food is an apple',
'bar' => 'This food is a bar',
'cake' => 'This food is a cake',
default=>'no match found'
};
var_dump($return_value);
  Example
Match Cont’d
$food = 'lime';
 When the implementation of one or
more matches is the same the match $return_value = match ($food) {
expression can be separated by commas 'apple' => 'This food is an apple',
and the implication sign pointing to the
common expression they evaluate to: 'bar' => 'This food is a bar',
'cake' => 'This food is a cake',
'orange','lemon','lime' => 'This is a kind
of citrus',
default=>'no match found'
};
var_dump($return_value);
  Example
Match Cont’d
$age = 13;
 You can also match a Boolean true or
false with the outcome of an expression $result = match (true) {
that evaluate to the Boolean type. $age >= 65 => 'senior',
$age >= 25 => 'adult',
$age >= 18 => 'young adult',
default => 'kid',
};
var_dump($result);
Switch Vs Match
 The match expression is similar to a switch statement but has some key
differences:
1. A match arm compares values strictly (===) instead of loosely as the
switch statement does.
2. A match expression returns a value.
3. match arms do not fall-through to later cases the way switch
statements do.
4. A match expression must be exhaustive.
Control Loops
Control Loops
 Loops in PHP and other programming languages are control structures
used to execute the same block of code a specified number of times.
 Some control loops cause a repeated execution of a specified block of
codes while a condition remains true thus called while and do-while
loops.
 Others cause the repetition over a specified number of counts hence
the name for loop.
 Another causes repetition over the iteration items in an array or array-
like structures hence, foreach loop.
While Loops
 These loops cause the repeated execution of a nested block of code
given that a condition holds true.
 It tells PHP to execute the nested statement(s) repeatedly, as long as the
while expression evaluates to true.
 Its syntax:  Alternate syntax:
while (expr){ while (expr):
statement statement
... ...
} endwhile;
While Loops Cont’d
 For example, we can display the count from
value 1 until x is greater than 10
$x = 0;
while($x <= 10){
echo $x;
$x = $x + 1;
}
While Loops Cont’d Example
 Note: to avoid having an infinite loop $x = 0;
(that is, a loop that runs for ever) while($x <= 50){
ensure you have a way of modifying the if($x == 45) {
condition the while statement depends
on such that a logical termination of break;
the loop can be attained; }
 To terminate and exit a while loop or echo $x;
other kinds of control loops $x = $x + 1;
prematurely use the break; statement
as seen: }
Do-While Loops Example
 Similar to the while loop but differ in $x = 0;
the sense that the code block to be do{
repeated is executed at least once echo $x;
before evaluating the conditional
statement. $x = $x + 1;
 Thus, the statement is executed at least }while($x >= 50);
once whether the condition evaluates
to true or false.
For Loops Example
 This loops repeats a block of code until for ($i = 1; $i <= 10; $i++) {
a certain condition is met
echo $i;
 The loop works by counting from a
initial value (expr1) and incrementing it }
based on a defined expression (expr3)
until it reaches a predefined value
(expr2) at which the loop is terminated.
 On each count the code in the loop is
executed
for (expr1; expr2; expr3){
statement
}
For Loops Cont’d
 To create an infinite for loop just replace the three expressions with
spaces.
Example
for ( ; ; ) {
echo 'yes';
}
For Loops Cont’d Correct Way:
 While expressions are allowed to $people = array(

be used as arguments to the for array('name' => 'Kalle', 'salt' => 856412),
loops, the cost of evaluating this array('name' => 'Pierre', 'salt' => 215863)
expressions should not be );
expensive $size = count($people);
for($i = 0, $i < $size; ++$i) {
 Wrong way:
$people[$i]['salt'] = mt_rand(000000, 999999);
$people = array(
}
array('name' => 'Kalle', 'salt' => 856412),
array('name' => 'Pierre', 'salt' => 215863)
);
for($i = 0, $size = count($people); $i < $size; ++$i) {
$people[$i]['salt'] = mt_rand(000000, 999999);
}
Foreach Loops
 The foreach construct provides an easy way to iterate over arrays.
 foreach works only on arrays and objects, and will issue an error when
you try to use it on a variable with a different data type or an
uninitialized variable.
 There are two syntaxes:
foreach (iterable_expression as $value){
statement
}
foreach (iterable_expression as $key => $value){
statement
}
Foreach Loops Cont’d
Unsetting A Variable:
 Example
$arr = array(1, 2, 3, 4);
$arr = array(1, 2, 3, 4);
foreach ($arr as $key => $value) {
foreach ($arr as $key =>
echo "{$key} => {$value}, "; $value) {
} echo "{$key} => {$value}, ";
 Note: that the variable $value has its last value
retained even after exiting the foreach loop.
}
 This can become a problem when passing that unset($value);
argument by reference as any modification to the
variable leads to modifications in the array. echo $value;
 Solution is to unset the variable $value after exiting
the foreach loop
Foreach Loops Cont’d $array = [
 Unpacking Nested Arrays With list() [1, 2],
 It is possible to iterate over an [3, 4],
array of arrays and unpack the ];
nested array into loop variables foreach ($array as list($a, $b)) {
by providing a list() as the value. // $a contains the first element of the nested array,
 For example: // and $b contains the second element.

echo "A: $a; B: $b\n";

}
Questions & Answers