The continue statement in MATLAB

The continue statement in MATLAB is used to pass control to the next iteration in for and while statements.  Let’s suppose someone wants to find and print the value of k^2-50 for all integers in [-10,10] domain.  The mfile for that is given below.

% For integers k=-10,-9,….,9,10,
% the function k^2-50 will take positive as
% well as negative values. 
%For example, for k=-9, k^2-50=31; for k=1,
% k^2-50=-49; for k=8, k^2-50=14.
% The loop below will calculate values of k^2-50 for
% all values of requested k.
for k=-10:1:10
    val=k^2-50;
fprintf(‘\n k=%g  val=%g’,k,val)
end

___________________________________________________________

Let’s suppose now you are asked to calculate and print value of k^2-50 for all integers in [-10,10] domain but only if (k^2-50) is positive.

% The loop below will calculate and print values of k^2-50
% for all values of the requested k
% for which k^2-50 is positive.
for k=-10:1:10
    if (k^2-50<0)
        continue;
    end
    val=k^2-50;
    fprintf(‘\n k=%g  val=%g’,k,val)
end

____________________________________________________________

Can you do what you did above using the while statement.  Yes, the MATLAB code is given below.

% Equivalent in while
% The loop below will calculate values of k^2-50
% for all values of the requested k for which k^2-50 is positive.
k=-10;
while (k<=10)
    if (k^2-50>0)
        val=k^2-50;
        fprintf(‘\n k=%g  val=%g’,k,val)
    end
k=k+1;
end

_______________________________________________________

This post is brought to you by Holistic Numerical Methods: Numerical Methods for the STEM undergraduate at http://numericalmethods.eng.usf.edu, the textbook on Numerical Methods with Applications available from the lulu storefront, and the YouTube video lectures available at http://numericalmethods.eng.usf.edu/videos and http://www.youtube.com/numericalmethodsguy

Subscribe to the blog via a reader or email to stay updated with this blog. Let the information follow you.