Topical Information

This lab should provide you with practice in stream formatting. classes are pretty much useless here. *grin* (There also may be opportunities for file handling!)

Program Information

Write a program that creates a table for the user's choice of basic math operations (+, -, *, /, and %). These operations will all be performed in an integer-only way. (Modulo doesn't work with decimals anyway... And you're going to have enough trouble lining up the table without dealing with decimal places on division!)

The user should also be allowed to choose the size of the table (it will, of course, be square: 4x4, 5x5, etc.). You may limit the maximum size of the table, for formatting purposes.

Make sure your table is neat and lines up nicely (see the examples below). Columns should all be of equal width. This should be the minimum width necessary to hold the largest answer for the table's operation. (Be careful! This may be a negative value!) Note that, if each column is as small as possible, you can fit more of them on the screen...

Try to use functions to break up the program into more manageable -- re-usable -- pieces. (You'll note that most of the table display is identical but for the corner symbol, the largest answer width, and the calculation of the entries themselves... Perhaps you could parameterize the data portions of this and ...er... 'farm-out' the calculation of the entries to a parameterized little helper function..?)

As an example, the program interaction might look something like (the parts in this color are typed by the user):

$ ./mathtable.out

                 Welcome to the Math Table Program!!!

Table Menu

1) Addition table
2) Multiplication table
3) Subtraction table
4) Division table
5) Remainder table
6) Quit

Choice:  a


What size should the addition table be?  50

I'm sorry, 50 is too large of an addition table to print on the screen...

What size should the addition table be?  5

Thank you...calculating...

   + |  1  2  3  4  5
 ----+-----------------
   1 |  2  3  4  5  6
   2 |  3  4  5  6  7
   3 |  4  5  6  7  8
   4 |  5  6  7  8  9
   5 |  6  7  8  9 10

Table Menu

1) Addition table
2) Multiplication table
3) Subtraction table
4) Division table
5) Remainder table
6) Quit

Choice:  R

What size should the remainder table be?  7

Thank you...calculating...

   % | 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
 ----+----------------
   1 | 0 1 1 1 1 1 1
   2 | 0 0 2 2 2 2 2
   3 | 0 1 0 3 3 3 3
   4 | 0 0 1 0 4 4 4
   5 | 0 1 2 1 0 5 5
   6 | 0 0 0 2 1 0 6
   7 | 0 1 1 3 2 1 0

Table Menu

1) Addition table
2) Multiplication table
3) Subtraction table
4) Division table
5) Remainder table
6) Quit

Choice:  3

What size should the subtraction table be?  30

I'm sorry, 30 is too large of a subtraction table to print on the screen...

What size should the subtraction table be?  -3

I'm sorry, -3 would be stupid...

What size should the subtraction table be?  3

Thank you...calculating...

   - |  1  2  3
 ----+-----------
   1 |  0 -1 -2
   2 |  1  0 -1
   3 |  2  1  0

Table Menu

1) Addition table
2) Multiplication table
3) Subtraction table
4) Division table
5) Remainder table
6) Quit

Choice:  q

Thank you for using the MTP!!

Endeavor to have a auspicious day!

$

Thought Provoking Questions

  1. How can you easily determine the widest that the columns need to be? (Hint: See this page about calculating the number of digits in a whole number.)
  2. Once you know the width of a column, how can you determine whether a table will fit on the screen?
  3. How can you get the columns to line up so nice and neat?
  4. How can you get your menu to accept both character and numeric input like that? (Hint: You don't need to resort to peek here!)
  5. Do you need any flags to get your columns to line up neatly?

This assignment is (Level 2).

Options

Total Level Possible

If you did all above options, this lab could be worth as much as (Level 3.5).