It's a syntax sugar feature, so its presence or absence will make little difference in the grand scheme of things -- there will always be a relatively easy way

It's a syntax sugar feature, so its presence or absence will make little difference in the grand scheme of things -- there will always be a relatively easy way to rewrite code without it. Personally, I would prefer the loop iteration variable to only be in scope within the loop body, and generally write code as if that were true. Also, repeating the sentinel test is asking for a future edit to change one and miss the other.