Special Edition Using Microsoft® Visual Basic® .NET

Understanding If Statements

For many decisions, you may want to execute a statement (or group of statements) only if a particular condition is True. Two forms of the If statement handle True conditions: the single-line If statement and the multiple-line If statement. Each uses the If statement to check a condition. If the condition is True, the program runs the commands associated with the If statement. For example, the following two If statements perform the same function:

'Single-Line IF 
If x > 5 then x = 0 

'Multiple-Line IF 
If x > 5 Then 
    x = 0 
End If 

In the code sample, the condition is the value of the variable x being greater than 5. If this condition is True the statement x=0 will be executed. If the condition is False (in the preceding ...