CS1001E

Computer Programming

Lecture #3
Variables - declaration, assignment, input/output

Monsoon 2024
Amit Praseed, Saleena N, Santosh Kumar Behera
CSED NITC

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Variables

• Variable name denotes a memory location where the program can

store value
• Every variable in C has an associated data type
• indicates the type of values that can be stored in the variable and the set of
operations that can be performed on it
• e.g. Integer data type
• to store integer values
• declared using the keyword int

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Variable Declarations
• Declaration indicates the type of a variable

• Every variable must be declared prior to its use

e.g.: int a;
declares a as int type variable

• Declaration reserves memory space, but does not assign an initial

value

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Naming Variables
• Rules for forming valid variable names
• a name consists of letters, digits and underscore( _ )
• should start with a letter or underscore
• should not be a keyword

• Some valid variable names:

marks, grade, employee_id, total, x1, studentName

• C is case sensitive: marks and Marks are two different variable

names

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Keywords
Words having special meaning to the compiler.

Some of the keywords:

break case char const continue default do
double else float for goto if int
long register return short signed sizeof struct
switch typedef union unsigned void while

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Variable Declaration: list of variables
#include <stdio.h>

int main()
{
int a, b, sum;
…
}

The three variables a, b and sum are declared as int type

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Assigning value to variable

Assignment operator =

Put the value on the RHS to the

variable (memory location) on
a = 5 ; the LHS

a=5; is an assignment statement

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Assignment statement: examples
#include <stdio.h>

int main()
{
int a,b;
a=5;
b=10;
……
}

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Assignment updates memory location
Each variable has a location in memory

int a, b; a b

a=5; a 5 b

b=10; a 5 b 10

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Printing the value of variable
printf(“a = %d”, a);

• the value of a is printed in place of %d

• %d is a conversion specification - to convert the corresponding

value to decimal
• the d in %d stands for decimal integer

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Example Program: printing the values of variables
#include <stdio.h>
int main()
{
int a,b;
a=5; b=10;
printf(“Value of variable a is %d\n”, a);
printf(“Value of variable b is %d\n”, b);
}
o/p:
Value of variable a is 5
Value of variable b is 10

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Variable initialization
A variable can be initialized in its declaration

int a=10;

declares a as int type variable and assigns it the initial value 10

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Example Program: initializing variables
#include <stdio.h>
int main()
{
int a=5,b=10;
printf("Value of variable a is %d\n", a);
printf("Value of variable b is %d\n", b);
}
o/p:
Value of variable a is 5
Value of variable b is 10

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Exercise
#include <stdio.h>

int main()
{
int min=0, max=100;
min=10;
printf("min=%d max=%d\n", min,max);
}

o/p: ?
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Exercise
#include <stdio.h>

int main()
{
int min=0, max=100;
min=10;
printf("min=%d max=%d\n", min,max);
}

o/p: min=10 max=100

Note: the second assignment to min overwrites the earlier value 0

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 Input: reading the value of a variable

• User input can be taken using the scanf() function.

scanf(“%d”, &a);
Variable name
Conversion specification (where to store the data once read)
(which type of data do you want & stands for “address of”
to read?)

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Reading a value and storing in a variable
#include <stdio.h>
int main( )
{
int a;
printf("Enter a number\n");
scanf("%d",&a);
printf("The value entered is %d\n", a);
}

A sample run of the program: (first line is to prompt the user to input a value, second line is user input)
Enter a number
10
The value entered is 10

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Exercise: complete the program to read values of variables
a, b and print the values
#include <stdio.h>
int main( )
{
int a, b;
printf("Enter value of a\n");
scanf("%d",&a);
printf("Enter value of b\n");
...
}

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Multiple Inputs using a Single scanf()
#include <stdio.h>
int main( )
{
int a, b;
printf(“Enter two numbers\n”);
scanf(“%d%d”,&a,&b);
printf("a=%d b=%d\n", a,b);
}

A sample run of the program:

Enter two numbers

10
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a=10 b=20 19
Programming Exercise
#include <stdio.h>

int main()
{
int min=0, max=100;
printf("Enter the minimum value\n");
scanf("%d",&min);
printf("min=%d max=%d\n", min,max);
}

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scanf(): updating memory locations

int a=0, b=0; a 0 b 0

...
scanf(“%d”, &a); if user enters 5
... a 5 b 0

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scanf(): updating memory locations

int a=0, b=0; a 0 b 0

...
scanf(“%d”, &a); if user enters 5

... a 5 b 0

scanf(“%d”, &a); if user enters 10

a ? b ?

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Major References
1. B. W. Kernighan and D. M. Ritchie, The C Programming Language,
2nd ed., Pearson Education India, 2015.
2. P. J. Deitel and H. M. Deitel and, C: How to program, 9th ed.
Pearson Education, 2023.

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