CS2311 Computer Programming

Dr. Henry Xu

Lecture 3: Basic Syntax

Part II: Operators, Basic I/O
 Outline
• Operators and punctuators

• Basic I/O with cin and cout

 Operators and punctuators

• An operator specifies an operation to be

performed on some values
– These values/variables are called the operands of the
operator
• Some examples: +, -, *, /, %, ++, --,>>,<<
• Some of these have meanings that depend on
the context

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 Operators
Category Examples
Arithmetic +, -, /, *, %, =, ++, --
Comparison/relational ==, !=, >, <, >=, <=
Logical !, &&, ||
Bitwise ~, &, |, ^, <<, >>
Compound assignment +=, &=, <<=, etc.
Member and pointer a[b], *, &, ->, etc.
Others ::, sizeof, etc.
Increment & decrement operators
• Increment and decrement operators: ++ and --
– k++ and ++k are equivalent to k=k+1
– k-- and --k are equivalent to k=k-1

• Post-increment and post-decrement: k++ and k--

– k’s value is altered AFTER the expression is evaluated
int k=1, j;
j=k++; /* result: j is 1, k is 2 */

• Pre-increment and pre-decrement: ++k and --k

– k’s value is altered BEFORE evaluating the evaluation
int k=1, j;
j=++k; /* result: j is 2, k is 2 */

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 An example
Old x New x Output
int x=3; 3 3
cout << x; 3 3 3

cout << ++x; 3 4 4

cout << x; 4 4 4

cout << x++; 4 5 4

cout << x; 5 5 5

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 Precedence & associativity of operators

 An expression may have more than one operator and its

precise meaning depends on the precedence and
associativity of the involved operators
 What is the value of variables a, b and c after the execution of
the following statements
int a, b = 2, c = 1;
a = b+++c;

 Which of the following interpretation is right?

a = (b++) + c; /* right */
or a = b + (++c); /* wrong */

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 What values are printed?
int a=0,i=0;
cout << "i= " << i << endl;

a=0;
i=1+(a++);
cout << "i= " << i << endl;
cout << "a= " << a << endl;

a=0;
i=1+(++a);
cout << "i= " << i << endl;
cout << "a= " << a << endl;

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 i=1+(a++); i=1+(++a);
0 1

Use original value of Use updated value of

a before a after increment
increment
i=1+0 i=1+1
=1 =2

Value of a is 1 in
both cases
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 Answer
int a=0,i=0;
cout << “i= " << i << endl;

a=0;
i=1+(a++);
Output
cout << "i= " << i << endl;
cout << "a= " << a << endl; i=0
i=1
a=1
i=2
a=0; a=1
i=1+(++a);
cout << "i= " << i << endl;
cout << "a= " << a << endl;

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Precedence & associativity of operators
Precedence: order of evaluation for different operators.

Associativity: order of evaluation for operators with the same

precedence.
Operator Precedence (high to low) Associativity

:: None

. -> [] Left to right

() ++(postfix) --(postfix) Left to right

+(unary) - (unary) ++ (prefix) -- (prefix) Right to left

* / % Left to right

+ - Left to right

= += -= *= /= etc. Right to left

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 Assignment operator =
• Generic form
variable = expression;

• = is an assignment operator that has nothing to do with

mathematical equality (which is == in C++)

• An expression itself has a value, e.g., [demo]

a=(b=2)+(c=3);
– An assignment statement has a value equal to the operand
– In the example, the value of a is 5;
– Be careful about implicit type conversion

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 Examples of assignment statements
/* Invalid: left hand side must be a variable */
a + 10 = b;

/*assignment to constant is not allowed*/

2=c;

/* valid but not easy to understand */

int a, b, c;
a = (b = 2) + (c = 3);

/* avoid complex expressions*/

int a, b, c;
b = 2;
c = 3;
a = b + c;

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 Swapping the values
• We want to swap the content of two variables, a and
b.
• What's wrong with the following program? [demo]
void main(){
int a=3, b=4;
a=b;
b=a;
}
• We need to make use of a temporary variable
c=b; /*save the old value of b*/
b=a; /*put the value of a into b*/
a=c; /*put the old value of b to a*/

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Efficient/Compound assignment
• The generic form of efficient assignment operators:
variable op= expression;
where op is an operator. The meaning is
variable = variable op (expression);
• Efficient assignment operators include
+= -= *= /= %= (arithmetic operators)
>>= <<= &= ^= |= (bitwise operators)
• Examples:
a+=5; is same as a=a+5;
a-=5; is same as a=a-5;
a+=b*c; is same as a=a+(b*c);
a*=b+c; is same as a=a*(b+c);
• Also known as compound assignment operators
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 Basic I/O – Keyboard and Screen
• A program can do little if it can’t take input and
produce output
• Most programs read user input from keyboard and
secondary storage
• After processing the input data, result is commonly
display on screen or write to storage (disk)
Program

d ata
of
t r eam
S

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 Basic I/O – cin and cout
• C++ comes with an iostream package (library) for basic I/O.
• cin and cout are objects defined in iostream for keyboard
input and screen display respectively
• To read data from cin and write data to cout, we need to use
extraction/input operator (>>) and insertion/output operator
(<<)

Input Input Stream Output Output

1.72 56 Program 18.9 BMI
Device Object Stream Object Device

cin >> weight

cin >> height
cout << “bmi”
cout <<weight/height/height
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 cout: Output Operator (<<)
• Preprogrammed for all standard C++ data
types
• It sends bytes to an output stream object, e.g.
cout
• Predefined “manipulators” can be used to
change the default format of arguments

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 cout: Output Operator <<
Type Expression Output
Integer cout << 21 21
Float cout << 14.5 14.5
Character cout << ‘a’; a
cout <<‘H’ << ‘i’ Hi
Bool cout << true 1
cout << false 0
String cout << “hello” hello
New line (endl) cout << ‘a’ << endl << ‘b’; a
b
Tab cout << ‘a’ << ‘\t’ << ‘b’; a b
Special characters cout << ‘\”’ << “Hello” << ‘\”’ <<endl; “Hello”
Expression int x=1; 8
cout << 3+4 +x;
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 cout – Change the width of output
• Change the width of output
– Calling member function width or using setw manipulator
– Must #include <iomanip> for setw
– Leading blanks are added to any value fewer than width
– If formatted output exceeds the width, the entire value is printed.
– Effect last for one field only
Approach Example Output (for
space)
cout.width(width) cout.width(10); 5.6
cout << 5.6 << endl; 57.68
cout.width(10);
cout <<57.68 << endl;
setw(width) cout << setw(5) << 1.8; 1.823
cout << setw(5) << 23 <<endl; 6.711
cout << setw(5) << 6.71;
cout << setw(5) << 1 <<endl;
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 cout – Set the precision and format of
floating point output
Must #include <iomanip>
Floating-point precision is six by default, i.e. 6 digits in total
Use setprecision, fixed and scientific manipulators to change the
precision value and printing format.
Effect is permanent

Default behavior
Example Output
cout << 1.34 << endl; 1.34
cout << 1.340 << endl; 1.34
cout << 1.3401234 << endl; 1.34012
cout << 0.0000000134 << endl; 1.34e-008

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fixed and scientific manipulators
fixed: always uses the fixed point notation
scientific: always uses the scientific notation
They change the meaning of precision (see the example)

Example Output

cout << fixed; 1.34

cout << 1.34 << endl; 1.34
cout << 1.340 << endl; 0.000000
cout << 0.0000000134 << endl; 1.340000e+00
cout << scientific; 1.340000e+00
cout << 1.34 << endl; 1.340000e-08
cout << 1.340 << endl;
cout << 0.0000000134 << endl;

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 cout setprecision
• Normally, setprecision(n) means output n significant
digits in total
• But with “fixed” or “scientific”, setprecision(n) means
output n significant digits after the decimal points

Example Output
cout << setprecision(2); 1.3
cout << 1.34 <<endl; 1.3e-08
cout << 0.0000000134 << endl; 0.00
cout <<fixed; 5.00e-004
cout << 0.0000000134 << endl;
cout << scientific << 0.0005 << endl;

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 cout – Other Manipulators
Manipulators Example Output
fill cout << setfill(‘*’); *******5.6
cout << setw(10); *****57.68
cout << 5.6 << endl;
cout << setw(10);
cout <<57.68 << endl;
radix cout << oct << 11 << endl; // octal 13
cout << hex << 11 << endl; // hexidecimal b
cout << dec << 11 << endl; 11

alignment cout << setiosflags(ios::left); 5.6

cout << setw(10);
cout << 5.6 <<endl;

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 cin: Extraction Operators (>>)
Preprogrammed for all standard C++ data types
Get bytes from an input stream object
Depend on white space to separate incoming data values

Input Input Stream

1.72 56 Program
Device Object

cin >> weight

cin >> height

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 Input Operator
Type Variable Expression Input x y
Integer int x,y; cin >> x; 21 21
cin >> x >> y; 53 5 3

Float float x,y; cin >> x; 14.5 14.5

Character char x,y; cin >> x; a a
cin >> x >> y; Hi H i

String char x[20]; cin >> x; hello hello

char y[20];
cin >> x >> y Hello World Hello World

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 Programming styles
• Programmers should write code that is understandable
to other people as well
• Meaningful variable names
• Which is more meaningful
– tax=temp1*temp2; // not meaningful
– tax=price*tax_rate; // good
• Meaningful Comments
– Write comments as you write the program
• Indentation

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 Indentation styles
void main() void main() {
{ int x, y;
int x, y; x = y++;
x = y++; }
}

Both are good. Choose one and stick with it.

void main()
{
int x, y; BAD!! Avoid this!!
x= y++;}

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Style is important

Both are
goo
one and s d. Choose
tick with
it.

A vo id this!!
BAD!!
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 Use of comments
• Top of the program
– Include information such as the name of organization,
programmer’s name, date and purpose of program
• What is achieved by the function, the meaning of the arguments
and the return value of the function
• Short comments should occur to the right of the statements when
the effect of the statement is not obvious and you want to
illuminate what the program is doing

Which one of the following is more meaningful?

tax = price * rate; /* sales tax formula */
tax = price * rate; /* multiply price by rate */

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