JAVA

Practical 05 1. Unary operators 2. Using Reals 3. Conversions 4. Type Casting 5. Scope 6. Constants

Unary Operators

Unary operators such as -- or ++ involve only one variable For example in order to increase x by 1 the statement x++ is enough When two variables are used in a calculation its called a binary operation

Unary Operators Reminder

1.

These only need one variable

++ (increment by 1) 2. -- (decrement by 1) 3. variable += x (same as variable = variable + x) variable -= x (same as variable = variable - x) 5. variable *= x (same as variable = variable * x) 6. variable /= x (same as variable = variable / x)
4.

Two ways of Using Unary Operators

Unary operators can be used in two ways; 1. Postfix 2. Prefix

Type Statement Equivalent

Postfix

n++

n = n +1

n-++n --n

n=n1
n=n +1 n =n -1

Prefix

Example

Although the end result is the same, there is a difference when using postfix or prefix

Output

The outputs are the following;

In n++
The value of n (9) is stored in x Then n is increased by 1 Resulting value stored in n

In ++n
First n (9) is increased by one Then the result is stored in x So we end up with the output above

Using Reals
When numbers with a fraction must be stored, real type variables must be used; 1. float 2. Double

These can be used just like regular variables However, when using float the letter f must be added at the end of the

Example

Conversions
When variables are assigned to other variables for example num1 = num2, one must keep in mind the following: 1. Both variables are of the same data type, or 2. The two variables are compatible, 3. or 4. The destination variable type is larger than the source type.

Examples
byte num2 =13; short num1 = num2; long num2;

This is correct since num1 is short and so its a

bigger variable type than byte. This is incorrect since were trying to fit long

int num1 = num2;

data into an int data type and it cannot be done

since its smaller.

Converting Variable Types

We must look at the hierarchy of variable types in order to know which variables can be converted Example double is the biggest, so it cannot be converted to anything else; whilst byte (since its the smallest) can be converted to any type (except char). Note that boolean data types cannot be converted to anything since they are not numbers

Hierarchy

double float long int

char short byte

Type Casting

Types can also be changed by specifying to which type you want to convert them in brackets. For example: int x = (int) 9.45;

This will change 9.45 to an integer (so it becomes a 9) and stores it in x.

Scope

Whenever the curly brackets are opened and closed, a scope is created If a variable is declared in the main scope it can be used throughout the method, however if it is declared between the curly brackets further in the program it will be only available in that scope.

Example

As you can see in the previous example x can be used throughout the program however j can only be used

Constants

A constant is very similar to a variable The difference is that its values cannot be changed Hence a constant is read-only

A constant is declared the same as a variable however the keyword final must be used in order to show that its a constant

Example

For example the mathematical value for PI never changes, Hence it can be declared as a constant in our program
final double PI = 3.142;

In order to identify variables from constants, constants are created using capital letters.