Control Flow in Visual Basic

Left unregulated, a program proceeds through its statements from beginning to end. Some very simple programs can be written with only this unidirectional flow. However, much of the power and utility of any programming language comes from the ability to change execution order with control statements and loops.

Control structures allow you to regulate the flow of your program's execution. Using control structures, you can write Visual Basic code that makes decisions or that repeats actions. Other control structures let you guarantee disposal of a resource or run a series of statements on the same object reference.

In This Section

• Decision Structures
  Describes control structures used for branching.

• Loop Structures
  Discusses control structures used to repeat processes.

• Other Control Structures
  Describes control structures used for resource disposal and object access.

• Nested Control Structures
  Covers control structures inside other control structures.

• How to: Transfer Control Out of a Control Structure
  Summarizes how to transfer directly out of a control structure.

Related Sections

• Control Statement for Visual Basic 6.0 Users
  Lists changes to the behavior and syntax of control structures from previous versions of Visual Basic.

• Control Flow Summary
  Provides links to language reference pages on this subject.