Code before the first 'case' in a switch-statement

c, switch-statement

Solution

It can be useful to declare variables that have a scope limited to the `switch` block (but be aware that any initialisers for those variables will be skipped):

switch (...)
{
    int n;

    case 0:
    ...
}

In theory, you could also put code there that you get to using `goto`.

Problem

In C it's possible to write code before the first `case` label. Are there any cases for which it is useful to do this or is it just a 'dead block of code' ? E.g.: ``` switch (...) { { int a = 0x2a; printf("%d\n", a); } case 0: ... } ```

Original source