CISC 105 Lab 03 FAQ
For each of the following questions, I'll give suggestions for
"troubleshooting" the problem.
Notes from Sara:
- When you script your answers, run each program a couple times with
different values, when appropriate. For example, for the printing
red/blue problem, you should execute the program at least once to
print red and at least once to print blue. (Bonus: think about what
the "best" numbers to prove that your code is correct.)
- Running the program multiple times with different input is also
useful to you in testing that your program works appropriately.
- We will be requiring good testing, e.g., running the
program with multiple, "interesting" input values, in all future
assignments, including project 1. For example, would entering a
negative number break your program for the red/blue printing program?
We will talk more about "interesting" input values in future labs.
- If your comments are not broken into several lines, they may be
cutoff in the printout. One solution is to type
esc q on
a long line. The shortcut esc q breaks the comments so
that they're less than the width of the page.
Do you want us to put
comments at the top of the program describing what the program does?
For this assignment, I expect that you will describe the program at a
high level at the top of your program. The description does not need
to be long. Just write what you're doing in your own words.
For part 8, I am having a hard time understanding the values I get
when I evaluate x = 1 < 5 > 0, and x = 1 < 5 < 2.
The computer evaluates these expressions from left to right. For
example, if the computer evaluates 4+3+1, it adds 4+3 (to get 7) and
then adds 1 to get 8. Can you see how that applies to this problem?
The conditions aren't "supposed" to make sense. They are examples
of bad code. You should understand that they do compile and why they
get their result. Then, you should find another way to express the
condition correctly.
As more practice, think about the condition if ( 1 < 2 > 1 ).
For lab03.10.c, are we allowed to use && or ||?
Nope!
Do you have any hints on how to get the numbers to display in
order with only two comparions?
How much information can you get from just one comparison? You won't
know the correct answer, but you can figure out what is *not* the
answer, right?
I am having a difficult time trying to figure out the answer to
part 10 of Lab3. I can't get the program to work with less than 3
numerical comparisons.
It's okay if the program contains three numerical comparisons, but the
program can only execute two comparisons when the user inputs a
number.
Problem 10: help finding the minimum
Try thinking about it this way: create a new variable that will
contain the "current" minimum. Go through the three integers and
"search" for the minimum. If there is only one integer (you've only
looked at/read in one integer), what would the minimum be? If there
are two integers, what would the minimum be? etc...
Is "=" a comparison operator?
No, "=" is the assignment operator. "==" is the comparison operator.
Do you take off for mistakes in the script but then are corrected
later down in the script?
No, but please indicate which part is wrong and highlight the correct
part so that it's easy for me to figure out what happened.