Date class.

Hello programmers,

I am trying to write a simple class, with a default constructor to output a date. All it has to do, is output the date "01/01/2013" (MM/DD/YYYY format). I'm compiling, and running, and getting output. However, the output is garbage data, the same data each time. What am I doing wrong?

Code:

#include <iostream>
using namespace std;

class Date
{
    private:
        int month;
        int day;
        int year;
    public:
        Date (int=01, int=01, int=2013);
};

Date::Date(int d, int m, int y)
{
    month=m;
    day=d;
    year=y;

}

int main()
{
    int d;
    int m;
    int y;

    cout<<d<<"/"<<m<<"/"<<y;

    return 0;
}

Thank you :3

Forget about the date and see the following
Let's take this example

Code:

int main()
{
     int a;
     std::cout<<a<<std::endl;
     return 0;
}

What value has the variable a????

Now take this example

Code:

int main()
{
     int a;
     a = 5;
     std::cout<<a<<std::endl;
     return 0;
}

What is the value of variable a?
Now take this example

Code:

int foo(int a)
{
     a = 5;
     return a;
}

int main()
{
     int a;
     a = foo(a);
     std::cout<<a<<std::endl;
     return 0;
}

what value does the variable a has?

a has a value of 5...

Originally Posted by mc74

a has a value of 5...

For which case?For example in first piece of code i wrote a has value of 5?

Mmm...no value in the first piece.

Bear with me..I'm not good with programming, and I don't like it. Just gotta pass this C++ class...I try my best though :3

The assignment is for the default constructor to automatically insert the date "01/01/2013" if no other date in input.

Correct
That is what is happening with you..I mean look at the main!

Code:

int main()
{
    int d;
    int m;
    int y;
 
    cout<<d<<"/"<<m<<"/"<<y;
 
    return 0;
}

Where is the object of Date?You do not create any object here!You do not call the constructor!
This piece of code will create an object of class Date

Code:

Date dateObject();

and because you pass no arguments the default values are going to be assigned in the data members of the class(these are d,m,y).
The next step is to print the values of the data members of this object you just created?How are you going to do that?Two ways.Create a member function of class Date (with name print i would say) which would print the data members of the class when called.Or create getters for every data member of class and when going to write cout in main call this geters in order to take the value of the geter function.

An example of geter

Code:

class Date
{
    private:
        int month;
        int day;
        int year;
    public:
        Date (int=01, int=01, int=2013);
        int getDay() { return day;}
};
 
using namespace std;

int main() {
    Date dateObject();
    int dayVariable = dateObject.getDay(); 
    cout<<dayVariable<<endl;
    return 0;
}

Thanks

Originally Posted by std10093

This piece of code will create an object of class Date

Code:

Date dateObject();

No, it declares a function named dateObject that returns a Date and takes no arguments. What you probably wanted:

Code:

Date dateObject;

Originally Posted by std10093

Create a member function of class Date (with name print i would say) which would print the data members of the class when called.

That is one option, though arguably better in this case would be to overload operator<< for std::ostream, e.g.,

Code:

std::ostream& operator<<(std::ostream& out, const Date& date)
{
    return out << date.day << '/' << date.month << '/' << date.year;
}

This way, one can write in the main function:

Code:

std::cout << dateObject << std::endl;

Originally Posted by std10093

Code:

int getDay() { return day;}

Since a getter function does not modify the observable/logical state of the object, it should be declared const:

Code:

int getDay() const { return day; }

Thank you for the correction and nice advises

Definitely overload operator<<.
Note that we're leaving the goal of formatting the day and month values with two digits as an exercise for the original poster to research and implement.

We are also leaving it as an exercise to fix the date format to the "correct" format DD/MM/YYYY

Code:

        Date (int=01, int=01, int=2013);

But the month and day are in octal Remember remember oct 31 is dec 25.

We are also leaving it as an exercise to fix the date format to the "correct" format DD/MM/YYYY

Implying the correct format is not the ISO format. YYYY/MM/DD.

Hence the quotes, whiteflags.