8_compound_statements_python_3717_documentation_1.txt

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Compound statements contain (groups of) other statements; they affect or control
the execution of those other statements in some way.  In general, compound
statements span multiple lines, although in simple incarnations a whole compound
statement may be contained in one line.

Theif,whileandforstatements implement
traditional control flow constructs.tryspecifies exception
handlers and/or cleanup code for a group of statements, while thewithstatement allows the execution of initialization and
finalization code around a block of code.  Function and class definitions are
also syntactically compound statements.

A compound statement consists of one or more ‘clauses.’  A clause consists of a
header and a ‘suite.’  The clause headers of a particular compound statement are
all at the same indentation level. Each clause header begins with a uniquely
identifying keyword and ends with a colon.  A suite is a group of statements
controlled by a clause.  A suite can be one or more semicolon-separated simple
statements on the same line as the header, following the header’s colon, or it
can be one or more indented statements on subsequent lines.  Only the latter
form of a suite can contain nested compound statements; the following is illegal,
mostly because it wouldn’t be clear to whichifclause a followingelseclause would belong:

Also note that the semicolon binds tighter than the colon in this context, so
that in the following example, either all or none of theprint()calls are
executed:

Note that statements always end in aNEWLINEpossibly followed by aDEDENT.  Also note that optional continuation clauses always begin with a
keyword that cannot start a statement, thus there are no ambiguities (the
‘danglingelse’ problem is solved in Python by requiring nestedifstatements to be indented).

The formatting of the grammar rules in the following sections places each clause
on a separate line for clarity.

Theifstatement is used for conditional execution:

It selects exactly one of the suites by evaluating the expressions one by one
until one is found to be true (see sectionBoolean operationsfor the definition of
true and false); then that suite is executed (and no other part of theifstatement is executed or evaluated).  If all expressions are
false, the suite of theelseclause, if present, is executed.

Thewhilestatement is used for repeated execution as long as an
expression is true:

This repeatedly tests the expression and, if it is true, executes the first
suite; if the expression is false (which may be the first time it is tested) the
suite of theelseclause, if present, is executed and the loop
terminates.

Abreakstatement executed in the first suite terminates the loop
without executing t
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