Direct vs Indirect Branching

(mostly by Bard, with double-checks on prompted output)

Feature	Direct Branch	Indirect Branch
Target address	Specified directly in the instruction	Stored indirectly in a register or memory location
Execution speed	Faster	Slower
Flexibility	Limited	More flexible
Examples	if-then-else, function calls	switch statements, jump tables

Direct Branch:

• Target address specified directly in the instruction. This can be done as an absolute address, a relative offset from the current instruction address, or an index into a branch table.
• Faster to execute: The target address is readily available, requiring only a singl