Switch
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Anonymous contributor3077 total contributions
Anonymous contributor
Published Aug 3, 2021Updated Dec 21, 2022
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A switch
statement provides a means of checking an expression against various case
statements. If there is a match, the code within starts to execute. The break
keyword can be used to terminate a case.
There’s also an optional default
statement marking code that executes if none of the case
statements are true.
Syntax
A switch
statement looks like:
switch (grade) {case 9:std::cout << "Freshman\n";break;case 10:std::cout << "Sophomore\n";break;case 11:std::cout << "Junior\n";break;case 12:std::cout << "Senior\n";break;default:std::cout << "Invalid\n";break;}
- The
switch
keyword initiates the statement and is followed by()
, which contains the value that each case will compare. In the example, the value or expression of the switch statement isgrade
. One restriction on this expression is that it must evaluate to an integral type (int
,char
,short
,long
,long long
, orenum
). - Inside the block,
{}
, there are multiple cases. - The
case
keyword checks if the expression matches the specified value that comes after it. The value following the first case is9
. If the value of grade is equal to9
, then the code that follows the:
would run. - The
break
keyword tells the computer to exit the block and not execute any more code or check any other cases inside the code block. - At the end of each switch statement, there is a
default
statement. If none of the cases aretrue
, then the code in thedefault
statement will run.
In the code above, suppose grade is equal to 10
, then the output would be “Sophomore”.
Note: Without the
break
keyword at the end of each case, the program would execute the code for the first matching case and all subsequent cases, including thedefault
code. This behavior is different fromif
/else
conditional statements which execute only one block of code.
Codebyte Example
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