[Solved] using goto keyword in C [closed]

Question

If the program really does print 0 for you then there might be a serious problem with your compiler (or even your machine…). My suspicion is that it doesn’t print 0, but your question is really why the program loops infinitely.

This is because the if-body only contains the print statement. So when a reaches 0 it isn’t printed but the lines

a--;
goto begin;

are still executed. The machine will obey, go back to begin and the loop continues. The quickest fix is to put braces around all the statements you want executed when a != 0:

if(a){
    printf("%d\n",a);
    a--;
    goto begin;
}

return 0;

This will make the program only loop until a is 0, after which it returns.

But the real problem is: don’t use goto (for this)! This is a perfect situation to use a while loop:

while(a--){
    printf("%d\n", a);
}

return 0;

(The braces around the while-body are not even strictly necessary here, but just good practice)

Accepted Answer