[fpc-pascal] basic question on begin, end;

[Tomas Hajny]

On 2020-09-22 14:46, dano none via fpc-pascal wrote:


Hello,

> I have a basic shuffle routine. I put being, end statements in the
> outer loop for clarification.
> It ended up producing random results.
> Commenting out the begin, end combination allows the code to run as 
> expected.
> My code is below, can someone tell me if the begin, end combination
> should actually make a difference, or should they be more ornamental
> in function?
  .
  .

Well, your question suggests that your understanding of the Pascal 
language (and creating algorithms in general) shall be improved. The 
begin / end pair creates a block which then becomes part of the program 
structure. If there is a language construct (e.g. a condition, a loop or 
with) which is applied to a statement within the source following this 
construct, using begin / end causes the construct to apply to the whole 
block between begin / end rather than a single statement, thus it indeed 
makes a big difference in many (most) cases.

Tomas