Thread: New to Programming - Simple Math Program Issue

Hello! I am new here and to programming as a whole. I am using GCC on Fedora to do a summer semeseter in C Programming. I am currently learning "if statements" while doing a program that calculates the area of a triangle. My problem is that the result is always "0". I am pretty sure the problem lies within my math, but I can't figure out how I have set it up wrong. Thanks for reading/looking.

I am using Heron's Formula. Here it is for reference:

area=sqrt(s(s-a)(s-b)(s-c)) where s=(a+b+c)/2

Code:

#include <stdio.h>
#include <math.h>

int main ()
{
    
float area, sideA, sideB, sideC, halfP;

printf("\n This program will calculate the area of a triangle.");
printf("Please enter the value for the first side: ");
scanf("%f", &sideA);
printf("Please enter the value for the second side: ");
scanf("%f", &sideB);
printf("Please enter the value for the third side: ");
scanf("%f", &sideC);

if (0 > sideA)
    printf("The distance must be positive. \n");
else if (0 > sideB)
    printf("The distance must be positive. \n");
else if (0 > sideC)
    printf("The distance must be positive. \n");
else
    halfP = (sideA+sideB +sideC)/2;
    area = sqrt(halfP*(halfP-sideA)*(halfP-sideB)*(halfP-sideC));
    printf("\n The area of the triangle is %f \n", &area);


return 0;
}

This isn't needed, but you could combine the 0 > number checks and eliminate the need for that final else:

Code:

/* ... */
    if(0 > sideA || 0 > sideB || 0 > sideC){
        printf("The distance must be positive. \n");
        return 0;
    }

    halfP = (sideA+sideB +sideC)/2;
    area = sqrt(halfP*(halfP-sideA)*(halfP-sideB)*(halfP-sideC));
    printf("\n The area of the triangle is %f \n", area);

Ah HA!, I didn't think about using hte "or" statement. I was tapping my head trying to think of how to put them all on one "if" statement. Thanks again!