EXIT-WHEN

The EXIT-WHEN statement permits a loop to complete conditionally. Whenever the EXIT statement is encountered, the condition in the WHEN clause is computed. When the condition is true, the loop completes and controls the passes to the next statement after the loop. An illustration is as shown below:

LOOP
FETCH c1 INTO...
EXIT WHEN c1%NOTFOUND; -- exit loop if condition is true
...
END LOOP;
CLOSE c1;


Until the condition is true, the loop cannot complete. Thus, a statement inside the loop should change the value of the condition. In the last illustration, if the FETCH statement returns a row, then the condition is false. When the FETCH statement fails to return a row, then the condition is true, the loop completes, and then control passes to the CLOSE statement. The EXIT-WHEN statement replaces a simple IF statement. For illustration, compare the following statements as:



IF count > 100 THEN        | EXIT WHEN count > 100;
EXIT;                                   |
END IF;                               |


These statements are logically equal, but the EXIT-WHEN statement is easier to understand and read.