Department of

Computer Science and Engineering

IPL - OUTREACH 2024

C PROGRAMMING
Date: 11.05.2024 - 14.05.2024

Dr.P.Durgadevi,Assistant Professor(S.G)
 The switch Statement
Topics
 Multiple Selection
 switch Statement
Unconditional Control Statement
 In C, an unconditional statement is a
statement that is executed without any
condition or consideration of whether a
particular condition is true or false.
Unconditional statements are executed
sequentially, one after the other, and they do
not depend on any conditional logic.
 Multiple Selection

 So far, we have only seen binary selection.

if ( age >= 18 ) if ( age >= 18 )
{ {
printf(“Vote!\n”) ; printf(“Vote!\n”) ;
} }
else
{
printf(“Maybe next time!\n”) ;
}
 Multiple Selection (con’t)

 Sometimes it is necessary to branch in more

than two directions.
 We do this via multiple selection.
 The multiple selection mechanism in C is the
switch statement.
 Multiple Selection with if
if (day == 0 ) {
printf (“Sunday”) ; (continued)
}
if (day == 1 ) { if (day == 4) {
printf (“Monday”) ; printf (“Thursday”) ;
}
}
if (day == 5) {
if (day == 2) {
printf (“Friday”) ;
printf (“Tuesday”) ; }
} if (day == 6) {
if (day == 3) { printf (“Saturday”) ;
printf (“Wednesday”) ; }
} if ((day < 0) || (day > 6)) {
printf(“Error - invalid day.\n”) ;
}
 Multiple Selection with if-else
if (day == 0 ) {
printf (“Sunday”) ;
} else if (day == 1 ) {
printf (“Monday”) ;
} else if (day == 2) {
printf (“Tuesday”) ;
This if-else structure is more
} else if (day == 3) { efficient than the corresponding
printf (“Wednesday”) ;
} else if (day == 4) {
if structure. Why?
printf (“Thursday”) ;
} else if (day == 5) {
printf (“Friday”) ;
} else if (day == 6) {
printf (“Saturday”) ;
} else {
printf (“Error - invalid day.\n”) ;
}
 The switch Multiple-Selection
Structure
switch ( integer expression )
{
case constant1 :
statement(s)
break ;
case constant2 :
statement(s)
break ;

...
default: :
statement(s)
break ;
}
 switch Statement Details
 The last statement of each case in the switch
should almost always be a break.
 The break causes program control to jump to
the closing brace of the switch structure.
 Without the break, the code flows into the next
case. This is almost never what you want.
 A switch statement will compile without a
default case, but always consider using one.
Good Programming Practices

 Include a default case to catch invalid data.

 Inform the user of the type of error that has
occurred (e.g., “Error - invalid day.”).
 If appropriate, display the invalid value.
 If appropriate, terminate program execution
(discussed in CMSC 201).
 switch Example
switch ( day )
{
case 0: printf (“Sunday\n”) ;
break ;
case 1: printf (“Monday\n”) ;
break ; Is this structure more
case 2: printf (“Tuesday\n”) ;
break ;
efficient than the
case 3: printf (“Wednesday\n”) ;
break ;
equivalent nested if-else
case 4: printf (“Thursday\n”) ;
break ;
structure?
case 5: printf (“Friday\n”) ;
break ;
case 6: printf (“Saturday\n”) ;
break ;
default: printf (“Error -- invalid day.\n”) ;
break ;
}
Why Use a switch Statement?

 A switch statement can be more efficient than

an if-else.
 A switch statement may also be easier to
read.
 Also, it is easier to add new cases to a switch
statement than to a nested if-else structure.
 The char Data Type
 The char data type holds a single character.
char ch;
 Example assignments:
char grade, symbol;
grade = ‘B’;
symbol = ‘$’;
 The char is held as a one-byte integer in memory. The
ASCII code is what is actually stored, so we can use
them as characters or integers, depending on our
need.
 The char Data Type (con’t)

 Use
scanf (“%c”, &ch) ;
to read a single character into the variable ch. (Note
that the variable does not have to be called “ch”.”)
 Use
printf(“%c”, ch) ;
to display the value of a character variable.
 char Example
#include <stdio.h>
int main ( )
{
char ch ;

printf (“Enter a character: “) ;

scanf (“%c”, &ch) ;
printf (“The value of %c is %d.\n”, ch, ch) ;
return 0 ;
}

If the user entered an A, the output would be:

The value of A is 65.
 The getchar ( ) Function
 The getchar( ) function is found in the stdio
library.
 The getchar( ) function reads one character
from stdin (the standard input buffer) and
returns that character’s ASCII value.
 The value can be stored in either a character
variable or an integer variable.
 getchar ( ) Example
#include <stdio.h>
int main ( )
{
char ch ; /* int ch would also work! */

printf (“Enter a character: “) ;

ch = getchar( ) ; /*same as scanf(“%c”, &ch); */
printf (“The value of %c is %d.\n”, ch, ch) ;
return 0 ;
}

If the user entered an A, the output would be:

The value of A is 65.
 Problems with Reading Characters
 When getting characters, whether using scanf( ) or
getchar( ), realize that you are reading only one character.
 What will the user actually type? The character he/she
wants to enter, followed by pressing ENTER.
 So, the user is actually entering two characters, his/her
response and the newline character.
 Unless you handle this, the newline character will remain
in the stdin stream causing problems the next time you
want to read a character. Another call to scanf() or
getchar( ) will remove it.
 Improved Character Example
#include <stdio.h>
int main ( )
{
char ch, newline ;

printf (“Enter a character: “) ;

scanf(“%c”, &ch) ;
scanf(“%c”, &newline);
printf (“The value of %c is %d.\n”, ch, ch) ;
printf (“Enter another character: “) ;
scanf(“%c”, &ch) ;
scanf(“%c”, &newline);
printf (“The value of %c is %d.\n”, ch, ch) ;
return 0 ;
}
 Additional Concerns with Garbage in
stdin

 When we were reading integers using scanf( ), we

didn’t seem to have problems with the newline
character, even though the user was typing ENTER
after the integer.
 That is because scanf( ) was looking for the next
integer and ignored the newline (whitespace).
 If we use scanf (“%d”, &num); to get an integer, the
newline is still stuck in the input stream.
 If the next item we want to get is a character, whether
we use scanf( ) or getchar( ), we will get the newline.
 We have to take this into account and remove it.