Lesson Set Data types, Variables, Variable Values &

2 Console output
Purpose 1. To briefly introduce the C++ programming language
2. To show the use of memory in programming
3. To introduce variables and named constants
4. To introduce various data types:
a. Integer
b. Character
c. Floating point
d. Boolean
e. String
5. To introduce the assignment and cout statements

Procedure 1. Students should read the Pre-lab Reading Assignment before coming
to lab.
2. Students should complete the Pre-lab Writing Assignment before
coming to lab.
3. In the lab, students should complete Labs 2.1 through 2.4 in sequence.
Your
4. Instructor will give further instructions as to grading and completion of
the lab.
5. Students should complete the set of lab tasks before the next lab and
get them checked by their lab instructor.

Contents Pre-requisites Completion Page

Time Number

Pre-lab Reading Assignment - 20 min 12

Pre-lab Writing Assignment Pre-lab Reading 10 min 15

Lab 2

Lab 2.1 20 min 16

Working with the cout Pre-lab reading
statement

Lab 2.2 Understanding of 20 min 16

Working with Variables Variables

Lab 2.3 Understanding of 20 min 17

Working with numeric data types Variables, their
types and usage

Lab 2.4 Understanding of 30 min 17

Working with non-numeric data Variables, their
types types and usage

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PRE-LAB READING ASSIGNMENT

The C++ Computer programming courses generally concentrate on program design

Programming that can be applied to any number of programming languages on the market.
Language It is imperative, however, to apply that design to a particular language. This
course uses C++, a popular object-oriented language, for that purpose. For
now, we can think of a C++ program as consisting of two general divisions:
header and main. The header, or global section, gives preliminary
instructions to the compiler. It consists of comments that describe the purpose
of the program, as well as information on which library routines will be used
by the program. Given below is a basic c++ program. All c++ programs follow
the following basic structure.
#include <iostream>
using namespace std;

/* These are
multi line comments */

// This is a single line comment

int main()
{
cout<<”Our First Program”;
return 0;
}
Everything in bold (everything above the int main() statement) is considered
the header or global section. Everything in bold and italic (enclosed within /*
and */ or staring with //) are comments and Everything else is the main
section.

Preprocessor The statements beginning with the # are called the preprocessor directives.
Directives The #include statement, indicates which library will be needed by the
program.
#include <iostream>

Libraries Recall from Lesson Set 1, that every program needs other modules attached
so that it may execute properly. Libraries are the sort of other modules that
are made part of your program by using #include preprocessor directive.
IOSTREAM is a library that contains code for basic input or output related
tasks. Your instructor will generally tell you which libraries are needed for
each particular programming assignment.

Comments Comments are included in every program to document what a program does
and how it operates. These statements are ignored by the computer but are
most valuable to the programmers who must update or fix the program. In
C++ comments begin with // which is an indication to the compiler to ignore
everything from the // to the end of the line. Comments can also cross line
boundaries by beginning with /* and ending with */. Notice that the first three
lines of the previous program all begin with // and thus are comments. Those
same lines could also have been written as the following:

/* These are
multi line comments */

// This is a single line comment

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Main Function Every C++ program has a main function which indicates the start of the
executable instructions. Every main must begin with a left brace { and end
with a right brace }. The statements inside those braces will be explained as
we progress through this lesson

Memory Memory storage is the collection of locations where instructions and data that
are used by the program are temporarily stored. Recall from Lesson Set 1
that a computer only understands a sequence of 1s and 0s. These are binary
digits or bits (Binary Digits). Eight of these brought together are called a
byte which is the most common unit of storage.

Analogy: These chunks of memory can be thought of as hotel mailboxes at

the registration desk. The size of each of those boxes indicates the type of
mail that can be stored there. A very small mailbox can only hold notes or
postcards. Larger mailboxes can hold letters, while even larger ones can hold
packages. Each mailbox is identified by a number or name of an occupant.
We have identified two very important attributes of these mailboxes: the name
or number, which indicates the mailbox that is being referenced, and the size,
which indicates what type of “data” can be placed there.

Example: Postcards Jim is an indication that the mailbox called Jim can
only hold postcards, while the statement Packages Mary indicates that the
mailbox called Mary can hold large packages. Memory locations in a
computer are identified by the same two attributes: data type and name.
Much of programming is getting data to and from memory locations and thus
it is imperative that the programmer tell the computer the name and data type
of each memory location that he or she intends to use. In the sample program
the statement float radius does just that, float is a data type that indicates
what kind of data can be stored and radius is the name for that particular
memory location.

Variables and The ability to change or not change the data stored can be a third attribute of
Constants these memory locations. Components of memory in which data values stored
can change during the execution of the program are called variables. These
usually should not be defined in the header or global section of the program.
In our sample program, radius is defined in the main function. Components of
memory in which data values stored are initialized once and never changed
during the execution of the program are called constants. They are often
defined in the global section and are preceded (in C++) by the word const.

Identifiers in C++ Identifiers are used to name variables, constants and many other components
of a program. They consist exclusively of letters, digits and the underscore
character. They cannot begin with a digit and cannot duplicate reserved
words used in C++ such as int or if. All characters in C++ are case sensitive;
thus memory locations called simple, Simple, and SIMPLE are three distinct
locations. It has become standard practice among programmers to make
constants all uppercase and variables predominantly lowercase characters.

Data types While doing programming in any programming language, you need to use
various variables to store various information. Variables are nothing but
reserved memory locations to store values. This means that when you
create a variable you reserve some space in memory. You may like to
store information of various data types like character, wide character,
integer, floating point, double floating point, boolean etc. Based on the
data type of a variable, the operating system allocates memory and

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 decides what can be stored in the reserved memory. C++ offer the
programmer a rich assortment of built-in as well as user defined data
types. Following table lists down five basic C++ data types

Data Type Keyword Size Range

Boolean Bool 1 Bit True and False
Character Char 1 Byte -127 to 127 or 0 to 255
Integer Int 4 Bytes -2147483648 to 2147483647
Floating point Float 4 Bytes +/- 3.4e +/- 38 7digits
Double Double 8 Butes +/- 1.7e +/- 308

Integers Integers are real numbers that do not contain any fractional component. They
take up less memory than numbers with fractional components.
The following statement defines integer variable in C++:

int sum;

Float and Double C++ uses both float and double to indicate floating point numbers, with
double using more memory than float. In computer science 3 = 3.0 is not a
true statement. The number on the left is an integer and the number on the
right is a real or floating point, number. Although mathematically the two are
equal, the computer stores them as different data types. The following two
statements define floating point variables in C++.

float average;
double nationaldebt;

Character Character data includes the letters of the alphabet (upper and lower cases),
the digits 0–9 and special characters such as ! ? . , *. All these symbols
combined are called alphanumeric. Each character data is enclosed with
single quotes to distinguish it from other data types. Thus '8' is different than
8. The first is a character while the second is an integer. The following
statement defines a C++ character variable initialized to 'a'.

char letter = 'a';

Boolean The Boolean data type, named after the mathematician George Boole, allows
only two values: true or false, which are internally represented as 0 and non-
zero, respectively. The following statement defines a Boolean variable
initialized to false.

bool found = false;

Assignment These statements place values in memory locations. The left side of an
Statements assignment statement consists of one and only one variable. The right side
consists of an expression. An expression can be any manipulation of literal
numbers (actual numbers such as 7 or 38, etc.), or the contents of constants
and/or variables, that will “boil down” to one value. That value is placed in the
memory location of the variable on the left. C++ uses = as the separator
between the left and right side of the assignment statement. Those new to
programming often get this confused with equality; however = in C++ is not
equality but rather the symbol to indicate assignment. The = in C++ is read as
“is assigned the value of”.

Example:

int total;

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 total = 10;

Here int is the data type and total is the name of the variable whereas 10 is a
literal or a value that is placed in the variable

Output Statements These instructions send information from the computer to the outside world.
This information may be sent to the screen or to some file. In C++ the cout
<< statement sends information to the screen. The #include <iostream>
directive must be in the header for cout to be used.

cout << total;

The above statement sends whatever value is stored in the variable total to
the screen.

Other Statements C++ uses the semicolon as a statement terminator. We can output literal
strings (such as “Hello”) by enclosing them in double quotes. The << operator
acts as a separator for multiple outputs.

cout << "The value of total is " << total << endl;

The endl statement causes the cursor to be moved to the beginning of the
next line.

Pre lab writing assignment

Fill in the blanks 1. A ____________________is a memory location whose value cannot

change during the execution of the program.
2. ______________is a data type that only holds numbers with no
fractional component.
3. ________________ is a data type that holds numbers with fractional
components.
4. The ____________ section gives preliminary instructions to the
compiler
5. _____________ are included in every program to document what a
program does and how it operates.

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Lab 2

Lab 2.1  Once you have opened the visual studio copy the following code in the
Working with cout code editor, try to run the code and observe the output. Write down the
Statement output that appears on the screen in the space given below

#include <iostream>
using namespace std;

int main ()
{

cout << "Hello World " << endl;

return 0;
}

Lab 2.2  Create a new project called variablesprogram.cpp, copy the following
Working with code it and try to run the program. Observe the output that appears
Variables and write it in the box given below
#include <iostream>
using namespace std;

int main ()
{
int age;
age = 10;
cout << "The age is " << age;
return 0;
}

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Lab 2.3  Create a new project called numericprogram.cpp, copy the following
Working with numeric code it and try to run the program. Observe the output that appears
data types and write it in the box given below
#include <iostream>
using namespace std;

int main ()
{
int number;
float weight;
age = 10;
weight = 5.5f;
cout << “ The age is ” << age;
cout << “ The weight is ”<< weight;
return 0;
}

Lab 2.4  Create a new project called nonnumericprogram.cpp, copy the

Working with non- following code it and try to run the program. Observe the output that
numeric data types appears and write it in the box given below
#include <iostream.h>
using namespace std;
void main()
{
char c = 'A';
cout << c << '\n';
}

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