Python has an unusual appendix to its looping structures. A “for” or “while” loop can also have an “else” clause. It was the topic of this exchange on Twitter:

@raymondh : else-clauses in #python’s for/while loops are trivially easy to explain but some minds just rebel at the thought: http://bit.ly/for_else

@holdenweb : @raymondh I think we can all agree that Guido may have taken his dislike of adding keywords a step too far with for/while ... else. #python

@raymondh : @holdenweb In 1991, “else” was the obvious choice because of the traditional way compilers implemented while-loops: pastebin.com/tY35CTJ4

If something is trivial to explain, but people aren’t getting it, maybe we should put more work into explaining it. Steve Holden knows a lot about Python, and feels that “else” was a stretch for this purpose, so even he doesn’t seem comfortable with for/else. It took me a while to get it too, but now it makes complete sense to me. Let me explain.

The classic (trivial) description of for/else is this: the “else” clause is executed if the loop completes normally, but not if it was interrupted with a “break”. This explanation is technically correct, but is also confusing. It seems like “else” should instead be “and also”, since the else clause isn’t an alternative to the loop, it’s added on, but only if the entire loop completed. So it seems like the wrong word. And Raymond’s resort to an examination of compiled code doesn’t help anyone understand it. One of the great things about Python is Guido’s insistence on usability of the language as a guiding principle in its design. There should be a user-centric explanation that makes sense.

Consider a common structure of a “for” loop:

for thing in container :

if something_about ( thing ):

# Found it!

do_something ( thing )

break

else :

# Didn't find it..

no_such_thing ()



Here you can see something interesting: there’s an “if”, and there’s an “else”. Those two words often go together, but not the way they are used here. But the pairing is important, and is the whole reason for the “else” keyword. When this loop is run, the “if” will be evaluated a number of times, and if it is ever true, the loop will break. A “break” means the “else” isn’t executed. Only if the “break” isn’t taken, that is, if the “if” is always false, will the “else” clause be run.

This is where the “else” keyword makes total sense. If you focus on the “if” statement, it is evaluated many times, and only if it is always false, will the “else” clause of the loop run. As the loop executes, the “if” becomes like a giant if/elif/elif ladder: each time around the loop adds another test of the condition, but only if all previous tests were false. The “else” clause caps it all off, just as it would in an explicit if/elif/else structure. And it works just like the explicit structure: if all of the conditions are false, then the “else” clause is run.

I think of the code above like this (informally):

if any ( something_about ( thing ) for thing in container ):

do_something ( that_thing )

else :

no_such_thing ()



This is the explanation that makes sense to me, because the “else” in my conceptual code is just like the “else” in the actual code. Maybe this isn’t a trivial explanation, but it’s one that makes sense to me, and I hope, to others.