Jump Statement

Jump statement is used to control program flow. More precisely, to move the program execution to the line of code that we want. In Java, there are three jump statements: break, continue, and return.

break

By using break statement, we can stop certain repetition process regardless defined condition or the rest of the statement contained in the loop block. This means that, when we put the break statement at loop block, the repetition will be immediately terminated and program execution will continue to the section of code below the corresponding loop structure, for example, take a look at the following program:.

class BreakDemo {
   public static void main(String[] args) {

      for (int i=0; i<10; i++) {
         if (i == 5) {
            break; //exit from loop block
         }
         System.out.println("row-" + i);
      }
      System.out.println("Statement after loop block");
   }
}

The program above will give the following result:

row-0
row-1
row-2
row-3
row-4
Statement after loop block

As shown in the above result, the program will stop the repetition when the variable i is worth 5, regardless to consider the condition (i < 10) as defined in the loop structure. The rest of statement contained in the loop block will not be executed again. After dialing break statement, the program will exit from loop block. The above provision also apply to the other loop structure: while and do-while.

continue

Like another programming language, Java provides continue statement that used to force the program to continue of loop process. continue statement can be regarded as the opposite of the break statement.

return

In Java, return statement is used to exit from code execution that contained in a method. Method will be explained further in the next post.