charliex

hrdwareguy: nope, you are missing the key point,
2 to 501 is inclusive which equals 500 steps.

example

say it was i=1 to i<=5 instead of 500 so
int i ; while (i<=5){ i++ };

program starts :
i = 1

:loop starts

is i less than or equal to 5 ? i=1, so yes, continue.

i is incremented to 2
"message is printed' (1rst time)

go back to top of loop

is i less than or equal to 5 ? i=2 so yes, continue.

i is incremented , is now 3
"message is printed' ( 2nd time)

go back to top of loop

is i less than or equal to 5 ? i=3 so yes, continue.

i is incremented , is now 4
"message is printed' (3rd time)

go back to top of loop

is i less than or equal to 5 ? i=4 so yes, continue.

i is incremented , is now 5
"message is printed' (4th time)

go back to top of loop

is i less than or equal to 5 ? i=5 so yes, continue. (not the key part here is less than *or* equal to 5 = 5 so its true, so it meets the condition.

i is incremented , is now 6
"message is printed' (5th time)

go to start of loop

is i less than or equal to 5 ? i is now 6, so stop the loop since 6 <= 5 is false (0)

5 messages were printed.

This is quite a common mistake made for junior or new programmers, its similar to people using the 5th element on an array defined as say int[5] and then using i = array[5]; which is of course the 6th element.