Houdini 20.5 VEX

Loops and flow control

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See also VEX functions. Most of the work in VEX is done with function calls. Most of the statements are looping constructs, many of which may be familiar from other languages such as C. While print is a statement in some languages (such as Python), in VEX you print using the printf function.

{}

As in C and many other languages, you can enclose multiple statements inside curly braces to act as a block.

For example, the if statement can execute one statement:

if ( needs_zapping() ) zap()

…or a block inside curly braces:

if ( needs_zapping() ) {
    zap()
    disintegrate()
    remove_dust()
}

do loop

do ‹statement› [while (‹condition›)]

Executes ‹statement›, and then loops if ‹condition› is true. Unlike while, do is guaranteed to execute the ‹statement› at least once.

for loop

for (‹init›; ‹condition›; ‹change›) ‹statement

Standard C-style for loop. Performs the ‹init› statement, then executes ‹statement› repeatedly while ‹condition› is true, executing the ‹change› statement at the end of each iteration.

foreach loop

foreach (‹value›; ‹array›) ‹statement

foreach (‹index›, ‹value›; ‹array›) ‹statement

Executes ‹statement› for each member of ‹array› (optionally sets ‹index› to the current position in the array). See foreach.

while loop

while (‹condition›) ‹statement

Executes ‹statement› repeatedly while ‹condition› is true.

Other looping statements

The forpoints, illuminance, and gather statements let you loop over data being processed by VEX.

if

if (‹condition›) ‹statement_if_true› [else ‹statement_if_false›]

Executes ‹statement_if_true› if ‹condition› is true.

If the else clause is included, ‹statement_if_false› is executed if ‹condition› is false.

return

Exits the function with an optional return value.

int max(int a, b) {
    if (a > b) {
        return a;
    }
    return b;
}

break

break immediately exits the loop. It is useful with the if statement to stop looping early when some condition is reached.

for (int i = 0; i < sizes; i++)
{
    mixamount += getAmount(roughness);
    if (mixamount > 1) {
        break;
    }
}

continue

continue jumps immediately to the next iteration of the loop.

foreach (x; myarray) {
    if (x < 10) continue;
    ...
}

VEX

Language

Next steps

Reference