For Loops

Quick reference

• 00:04 In the last video we talked about the while loop,
• 00:07 in this video I wanna talk about the for
• 00:09 loop, very similar to the while loop just slightly different formatting.
• 00:12 So let's take a look at that the for loop has this general look,
• 00:19 it's for initial counter;conditional;and increment.
• 00:25 And then we have this same do something.
• 00:30 So in the while loop, remember we set our counter outside of the loop.
• 00:36 And then we incremented the counter inside the loop.
• 00:40 Like that.
• 00:41 Well with the for loop we don't have to do any of that.
• 00:43 It takes care of it all right here inside this section.
• 00:47 So.
• 00:49 Let's go for x = 0.
• 00:52 And then our condition is let's say,
• 00:57 as long as x < 10, and then to increment
• 01:02 it we go x++ oops we need a variable x++.
• 01:08 And then whatever we wanna do in the loop,
• 01:12 we type it right here so let's go echo "Your number is x".
• 01:17 And that's it, in the past for our while loop we would've went x++ but
• 01:22 like I said we don't have to do that here, we've laid that out already right up here.
• 01:27 So basically it takes everything that a while loop does and
• 01:30 smooches it up in this one line right here, and takes care of it for you.
• 01:34 And I forgot to put a line break so let's do that, just so
• 01:36 we can read this a little bit better.
• 01:38 Number 0, 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9, so very, very similar to a while loop,
• 01:43 in fact let's look at a while loop and just sorta compare them.
• 01:48 While x < 10 and I'm just gonna copy this,
• 01:53 and of course we need to actually let's change this to y so
• 02:00 things don't get get confusing.
• 02:08 And of course remember we have to
• 02:11 initialize our variable outside of the loop.
• 02:14 So if we save this and I'm gonna put a couple of
• 02:21 line breaks here, just to separate these two.
• 02:25 We have the exact same output for our for loop and our while loop.
• 02:31 Let's get rid of this.
• 02:32 So you can see the difference.
• 02:34 I said earlier its a good idea to write elegant code,
• 02:37 to write as little amount of code as possible.
• 02:39 And under those circumstances, the for
• 02:41 loop seems like the one to use because it's less code, it's more compact,
• 02:46 it's all in one place, it makes a lot of sense, whereas this is more lines of code.
• 02:51 And it's just one of those times you go, who cares?
• 02:54 You know what I mean?
• 02:54 I like while loops so I use while loops, and I think the reason is,
• 02:58 is because I often forget the order that these three things go in.
• 03:02 So I'll try and increment first and assign it later.
• 03:05 It's just one more thing for me to have to memorize, and
• 03:08 I don't like to memorize things, so
• 03:10 I just tend to use the while loop because it's just like an if statement.
• 03:12 It looks just like an if statement.
• 03:14 And it is pretty easy to use.
• 03:15 But on the down side,
• 03:17 sometimes I forget to put my increment in it brings out and goes on for ever.
• 03:21 So, it really is just a personal preference which one of these loops
• 03:25 you wanna use, whatever you feel like doing, like I said there are some
• 03:29 very minor circumstances where you might be forced to use a for loop.
• 03:33 But offhand I can't really can't think of any of those.
• 03:36 They're pretty much interchangeable.
• 03:37 So those are loops.
• 03:39 In the next video, we're gonna sort of take a step back and
• 03:41 play around a little bit with all of this stuff that we've just learned.
• 03:44 And built something called "Fizz Buzz", it's a little game that you use for
• 03:47 interviews and that's a lot of fun.
• 03:49 And that will be the next video.

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