How to Break out of multiple loops at once in C#?

Question

What if I have nested loops, and I want to break out of all of them at once?

while (true) {
    // ...
    while (shouldCont) {
        // ...
        while (shouldGo) {
            // ...
            if (timeToStop) { 
                break; // break out of everything?
            }
        }  
    }
}

In PHP, break takes an argument for the number of loops to break out of. Can something like this be done in C#?

What about something hideous, like goto?

// in the innermost loop
goto BREAK
// ...
BREAK: break; break; break;

Answer 1

Goto is only hideous when abused. To drop out of the innermost loop of some nesting it's acceptable. BUT... one has to ask why there is so much nesting there in the first place.

Short answer: No.

Answer 2

Extract your nested loops into a function and then you can use return to get out of the loop from anywhere, rather than break.

Answer 3

You could pull some shenanigans and do something like this:

try{
    while (true) {
        // ...
        while (shouldCont) {
            // ...
            while (shouldGo) {
                // ...
                if (timeToStop) { 
                    throw new EndOfLoopException();
                }
            }  
        }
    }
} catch (EndOfLoopException) { }

The exception will be caught and the rest of the function will execute normally. Obviously, exceptions should be thrown when something BAD happens, but if you literally cannot extract this into a separate function, then I would probably recommend this over GOTO's anyday.

Answer 4

Introduce another control flag and put it in all your nested while condition like below. Also replaces the while(true) condition you have with that

bool keepLooping = true;
while (keepLooping) {
    // ...
    while (shouldCont && keepLooping) {
        // ...
        while (shouldGo && keepLooping) {
            // ...
            if (timeToStop) { 
                keepLooping  = false;
                break; // break out of everything?
            }
        }  
    }
}