'Parse error before X'...

[Alastor]

Hi, I'm pretty new to C programming and I'm using C-free 3.5 compiler to try a few lines of code. I usually get the error "Parse error before 'else'(for example)". What does it mean?. I get that error on lines 10 and 13 of the program below. What I was trying to do was make a program that prompts the user for 2 numbers, if the user types the same number, he has to type two numbers again. If the numbers are different, the program tells the user which number is bigger.
Perhaps I should have used "while", but I wasn't sure how to...

#include <stdio.h>
void main()
{
    int a,b,max;
    
    scanf("%d %d", &a, &b);
    if (a == b)
    printf ("The value of the numbers is the same\n");
    scanf("%d %d", &a, &b);
    else if(a<b)
        max = b;
    printf("The bigger number is: %d\n", max);
    else
    max = a;
    printf("The bigger number is: %d\n", max);
}

Thanks
Alastor

[cboard_member]

#include <stdio.h>
void main()
{
    int a,b,max;
    
    scanf("%d %d", &a, &b);

    if (a == b) {
        printf ("The value of the numbers is the same\n");
        scanf("%d %d", &a, &b);  // hmm...
    } else if(a<b) {
        max = b;
        printf("The bigger number is: %d\n", max);
    } else {
        max = a;
        printf("The bigger number is: %d\n", max);
    }
}

If you're going to need >1 line in an if statement, you need to enclose it in brackets.

[Alastor]

Thanks a lot, but why do you need the {} brackets for that but not for

#include <stdio.h>
void main()
{
    int a,b,max;

    scanf("%d %d", &a, &b);
    if (a>b)
     max=a;
else
max=b;
printf("The bigger number is %d\n", max)
}

Thanks
Alastor

[Cactus_Hugger]

You need { } brackets if you want more than one statement to be affected by an if.
If you say:

if(a < 2)
  a++;
b++;

Then a is only incremented if a is less than two, while b is always incremented. However, if you say:

if(a < 2)
{
  a++;
  b++;
}

Then a and b will only be incremented if a is less than two.

The same applies in many other places, such as for and while loops.
When I write code, if I use an if statement without the {}s, I leave the statement it affects on the same line as the if (ex: "if(b < 3) a++;") or, if I put it on the next line, I indent it to make it more apparent that it's part of the if(), and the next lines aren't. (Such as in the first example in this post.)

[Alastor]

thanks!