What would happen if the braces showing the loop body were removed?

A good answer might be:

The loop would become an infinite loop. Those two characters make a big difference!

Just Two Characters Different

Here is a fragment of the program, with those two braces removed: 

    if ( N >= 0 )
    {
      while ( N > 1 )    
 
        fact = fact * N;
        N    = N - 1;
      
      System.out.println( "factorial is " + fact );
    }
    else
    {
      System.out.println("N must be zero or greater");
    }

This fragment looks OK, but remember that blank lines and indenting are for people, not for the compiler. What the compiler sees is the same as: 

    if ( N >= 0 )
    {
      while ( N > 1 )     
        fact = fact * N;

      N    = N - 1;      
      System.out.println( "factorial is " + fact );
    }
    else
    {
      System.out.println("N must be zero or greater");
    }

In this version, it is clear that the value of N is never changed inside of the loop, so the condition N > 1 is always true, and the loop continues forever.

QUESTION 10:

What would happen to the original program if the brace after the else and its matching brace were removed?