Thread: Compressing Code?

Hi Adak, Thanks so much for your response!

Originally Posted by Adak

You want a conceptual jump, where a char variable (perhaps) is made in just one line of code, regardless of it's eventual type.

Instead of 3, 4, or 5 lines of code to get users input, you have just one, probably in a function just for getting users input. Think of your variables for this, like a spoon. You don't have a different spoon for every type of soup - you just use the same spoon, over and over.

And of course, a new variable to hold all the output, regardless of choices the user makes. Again, a single function for all output.

Perhaps one more function for all the computations. Let's say you have a function compute(). One parameter for that function, would be the users choice, so compute(parameter1) could be the users choice of what he/she wants to convert.

Perhaps the call compute(1) means convert Fahrenheit to Celsius.
Another parameter to compute() might be a string to hold the result of all the computations.

Ohh, so in a program like this you're saying the bulk of the code could be simplified into perhaps 3 functions? Like, "function getinput(), function compute(), function output(), or something? I like your spoon analogy. So it's like we only need one function per type of thing I want to do.

Originally Posted by Adak

You see where I'm going with this - a function with a different passed parameter value, can do wildly different things - and it can all go into a single answer string.

I think so. I'm barely familiar with functions via the C tutorial on this site, but I think I get what you're saying.

Originally Posted by Adak

I like your switch statement, but instead of doing all the computations in a series of somewhat repetitive lines of code, call one function, with different parameters.

It's time to start using functions, and that's a real strong step up in your programming.

Congrats on your indentation - lovely. No "break" is needed after your last case statement, since there is nothing left to be skipped over.

Thanks for the encouragement and kind words!