In article <6cao79$...@epic7.Stanford.EDU>,

It can easily be done without goto's, using only "structured
constructs". Admittedly nobody calls this well-structured code ;)

        i = 1;
        switch (-1) {
                do {
                        printf("i=%d\n", i);
        case -1:
                        printf("i=%d\n", i);
                } while (++i < 10);
        }

The point being that you can mess up source code multiple ways, and
goto's aren't the worst of your problems.

Yes, goto's can result in worse code.  But goto's can result in better
code too, so what's the point here?

The fact is that bad programmers generate bad code, regardless of
whether they use goto's or not. Blaming bad code on goto's is silly,
it's a tool like any other, and can be mis-used like any other.

You can create a better _simple_ compiler if your language does not have
goto's (and doesn't allow the ugly case construct above that C allows).
But any compiler worth anything at all can handle goto's as well as
anything else, and if it makes the source code better structured then it
often makes the compiler generate better code too.

Goto's are often very useful for error cases, or odd cases that aren't
structured and where structured constructs only result in strange on
non-obvious code. These cases may not be common, but they are no less
valid for all that..

So people, please don't vilify the poor goto, nor make it anything more
than it is. It's a supremely useful construct in some cases, and a
language without it is a poorer language.

                Linus