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<h3 class="section">10.6 The break Statement</h3>
<p><a name="index-g_t_0040code_007bbreak_007d-statement-707"></a>
The <code>break</code> statement jumps out of the innermost <code>for</code> or
<code>while</code> loop that encloses it. The <code>break</code> statement may only
be used within the body of a loop. The following example finds the
smallest divisor of a given integer, and also identifies prime numbers:
<pre class="example"> num = 103;
div = 2;
while (div*div <= num)
if (rem (num, div) == 0)
break;
endif
div++;
endwhile
if (rem (num, div) == 0)
printf ("Smallest divisor of %d is %d\n", num, div)
else
printf ("%d is prime\n", num);
endif
</pre>
<p>When the remainder is zero in the first <code>while</code> statement, Octave
immediately <dfn>breaks out</dfn> of the loop. This means that Octave
proceeds immediately to the statement following the loop and continues
processing. (This is very different from the <code>exit</code> statement
which stops the entire Octave program.)
<p>Here is another program equivalent to the previous one. It illustrates
how the <var>condition</var> of a <code>while</code> statement could just as well
be replaced with a <code>break</code> inside an <code>if</code>:
<pre class="example"> num = 103;
div = 2;
while (1)
if (rem (num, div) == 0)
printf ("Smallest divisor of %d is %d\n", num, div);
break;
endif
div++;
if (div*div > num)
printf ("%d is prime\n", num);
break;
endif
endwhile
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