Chapter 8
1. What is the definition of control structure?
Control structure is a control statement and the
collection of statements whose execution it
controls.
2. What did Böhm and Jocopini prove about
flowcharts?
he Bohm-Jacopini proof describes how to
construct a structured flow chart from an
arbitrary chart, using the bits in an extra integer
variable to keep track of information that the
original program represents by the program
location. This construction was based on
Bohm’s programming language P′′. The Bohm-
Jacopini proof did not settle the question of
whether to adopt structured programming for
software development, partly because the
construction was more likely to obscure a
program than to improve it. On the contrary, it
signalled the beginning of the debate. Edsger
Dijkstra’s famous letter, “Go To Statement
Considered Harmful,” followed in 1968.
Subsequent proofs of the theorem addressed
practical shortcomings of the Bohm-Jacopini
proof with constructions that maintained or
improved the clarity of the original program.
3. What is the definition of block?
A block is a section of code which is grouped
together. Blocks consist of one or more
declarations and statements. A programming
language that permits the creation of blocks,
including blocks nested within other blocks, is
called a block-structured programming
language.
4. What is/are the design issue(s) for all
selection and iteration control
statements?
Selection :
Two-way :
-What is the form and type of the expression
that controls the selection ?
-How are the then and else clauses specified ?
-How should the meaning of nested selectors be
specified ?
Multiple-Selection :
-On which type the selector is based ?
Iteration :
-How is the iteration controlled ?
-Where should the control mechanism appear
in loop statement?
5. What are the design issues for selection
structures?
-What is the form and type of the expression
that controls the selection ?
-How are the then and else clauses specified ?
-How should the meaning of nested selectors be
specified ?
6. What is unusual about Python’s design of
compound statements?
Python uses indentation to specify compound
statements. For example,
if x > y :
x=y
print "case 1"
equally indent statements are grouped as one
compound statement.
7. Under what circumstances must an F#
selector have an else clause?
If the expression returns a value, it must have
an else clause
8. What are the common solutions to the
nesting problem for two-way
selectors?
The common solution to the nesting problem is
to use alternating means of forming a
compound statements.
9. What are the design issues for multiple-
selection statements?
What is the form and type of the expression
that controls the selection?
- How are the selectable segments specified?
- Is execution flow through the structure
restricted to include just a single selectable
segment?
- How are the case values specified?
- How should unrepresented selector
expression values be handled, if at all?
10. Between what two language characteristics
is a trade-off made when deciding whether
more than one selectable segment is executed
in one execution of a multiple selection
statement?
In Ada, the choice lists of the case statement
must be exhaustive, so that there can be no
unrepresented values in the control expression.
In C++, unrepresented values can be caught at
run time with the default selector. If there is no
default, an unrepresented value causes the
whole statement to be skipped.
11. What is unusual about C’s multiple-
selection statement?
The C switch statement has virtually no
restrictions on the placement of the case
expressions, which are treated as if they were
normal statement labels.
This laxness can result in highly complex
structure within the switch body.
12. On what previous language was C’s switch
statement based?
ALGOL68
13. Explain how C#’s switch statement is safer
than that of C.
C# has a static semantics rule that disallows the
implicit execution of more than one segment.
Every segment must end with an explicit
unconditional branch statement which transfer
control out of the switch statement, or a goto,
which can transfer control to one of the
selectable segments
14. What are the design issues for all iterative
control statements?
-How is the iteration controlled ?
-Where should the control mechanism appear
in loop statement?
15. What are the design issues for counter-
controlled loop statements?
-What are the type and scope of the loop
variable ?
-Should it be legal for the loop variable or loop
parameters to be changed in the loop, and if so,
does the change affect loop control ?
-Should the loop parameters be evaluated only
once, or once for every iteration ?
16. What is a pretest loop statement? What is
a posttest loop statement?
Pretest means that the test for loop completion
occurs before the loop body is executed and
posttest means that it occurs after the loo body
is executed.
17. What is the difference between the for
statement of C++ and that of Java?
The loop control expression in Java is restricted
to boolean, unlike that of C++, even though the
syntax is similar.
18. In what way is C’s for statement more
flexible than that of many other languages?
All 3 expressions are optional.
Each expression can be entire statement or
sequence.
Expression value is value of last statement.
Everything can be changed within the loop.
Legal to branch into the body of a loop.
19. What does the range function in Python
do?
It is used to count loops in Python
20. What contemporary languages do not
include a goto?
Java language is the contemporary language
that doesn't include a goto, the loop bodies
cannot be entered anywhere but at their
beginning.
21. What are the design issues for logically
controlled loop statements?
- Should the control be pretest or posttest?
- Should the logically controlled loop be a
special form of a counting loop or a separate
statement?
22. What is the main reason user-located loop
control statements were
invented?
The main reason user-located loop control
statement were invented is to choose a location
for loop control other than the top or bottom of
the loop body.
23. What are the design issues for user-located
loop control mechanisms?
The design issues are whether the conditional
mechanism should be an integral part of the
exit or not & whether only loop body should be
exited or enclosing loops can also be exited.
24. What advantage does Java’s break
statement have over C’s break
statement?
- Java's break is unconditional labeled exits, so
we can create a label to a loop anywhere, and
we can cancel that loop with break <loopname>
statement. Meanwhile, in C++, break is
unconditional unlabeled exits, so breaks in here
treated as a statement, that will exit nearest
loop (Java can do this too).
25. What are the differences between the
break statement of C++ and that
of Java?
C++'s break is unconditional unlabeled exits,
meanwhile Java's one is unconditional labeled
exits.
26. What is a user-defined iteration control?
A user defined iteration control is a type of
looping structure that is primarily used for data
structures. Instead of being controlled by a
counter or boolean expression, it is controlled
by the number of elements in a data structure.
In order to achieve this the user-defined control
uses a user-defined frunction called an iterator.
This iterator is used to traverse through the
data structure and retrieve the elements in
whatever order the programmer defines.
27. What Scheme function implements a
multiple selection statement?
The Scheme multiple selector, which is based
on mathematical conditional expressions, is a
special form function named COND. COND is a
slightly generalized version of the mathematical
conditional expression; it allows more than one
predicate to be true at the same time. Because
different mathematical conditional expressions
have different numbers of parameters, COND
does not require a fixed number of actual
parameters. Each parameter to COND is a pair
of expressions in which the first is a predicate (it
evaluates to either #T or #F).
28. How does a functional language implement
repetition?
Recursion
29. How are iterators implemented in Ruby?
Ruby predefines several iterator methods, such
as times and upto for counter-controlled loops,
and each for simple iterations of arrays and
hashes.
30. What language predefines iterators that
can be explicitly called to iterate over its
predefined data structures?
Ruby: TIMES, EACH, UPTO
Or: php: CURRENT, NEXT, PREV
31. What common programming language
borrows part of its design from Dijkstra’s
guarded commands?
Dijkstra's guarded commands are the basis of
concurrence mechanism in CSP and Ada, also
function definitions of Haskell.