Complete Idiot's Guide to C++

The Complete Idiots Guide to C++ is the fun way to study the basics. By learning the mysteries of the C++ program, youll no longer fear the bite of the bits. From why to use C++ to how to use C++, this book spells it out easily. Soon phrases like the antimatter version of cout, multidimensional arrays, and binary files wont sound so foreign. And youll be programming faster than you used to say, "OOPs, I just trashed all those files. Did you need those, George?"

Table of Contents:
Introduction. 1. Things You Always Wanted to Ask About C++ (But You Didn't Want to Look like a Complete Idiot). Okay, What Is C++? So Why Do We Use C++? How Does It Work, Then? 2. From Absolutely Nothing to Screen a Display. A Morale Booster to Get You Started. Laying Down the Rules of the Game. The First Glimpse of a Screen Display. The cout Command Explained. Constants Don't Change! That's Why They Are Constant. Mixing Your Text with Numbers. 3. The Old Box of Variables Tricks. Knowing Your ints from Your floats. It's All in the Size of the Box. That cout Command Again. 4. Add, Take Away, and All That Schoolroom Stuff. Back to School for Basic Sums. Let C++ Do the Hard Math. Introducing cin, the Antimatter Version of cout. 5. One More Time with the for Loop (or Noch einmal, as They Say in Germany). Learn the Concept of the for Loop. Increment and Decrement Variables. Learn the Syntax of the for Loop. Increase Your Vocabulary with Some Professional C++ Shorthand. Don't Mix Your Cases! Converting Lowercase to Uppercase and Vice Versa. What Goes Up Must Come Down: The for Loop in Reverse. 6. A Case of Deja Vu: It's the while Loop. Go with the Flow: The while Loop. The Structure of the while Loop. Prefix, Postfix, What's the Difference? All Is Explained. The Test Comes Last with the do while Loop. 7. The Choice Is Logical, Captain, with if else. The Logic Path to Follow: You Make a Choice. A Conversation with the Senator: Your Age, Please. A Choice Within a Choice: It's Nesting Time. Some Words of Wisdom from One Who Has Fallen into the Trap. 8. If You Are Spoilt for Choice, the switch case Sometimes Helps. One Choice from Many. The C++ Syntax of switch. Nesting Revisited, Then Kicked into Touch. Introducing the Menu-Driven Program. A Final Point for the Observant. 9. Beyond the Simple, Into the Compound Arrays. Structured Variables! What Are They? Accessing the Array: The Dreaded Offset. I Do Declare in Shorthand. Arrays Are Easy, Tell Me More. 10. Spread Yourself Out in Space with Multidimensional Arrays. An Array Among Arrays. A Program on the Table. The Daily Sales Figures Observed. A Three-Dimensional World. Character Arrays Are Still Strings in Disguise. 11. Take a Trip Around the Solar System in a Parallel Array. How Do You Mix Data Types? Enter the Parallel Array. The Planets: A Program Fit for NASA. Stop Press. Vulcan Discovered at Last! A Fatter Parallel Array. 12. Divide and Conquer: Functions Rule Okay. Five Good Reasons to Use Functions. A Revision of the Rules of the Game. In Full Flow. A Fully Functional Program. The Secret Language Revealed, Pass by Value. Functions and Floats. Functions and chars. Some Key Points. Internal and External Variables. 13. Functions Can Talk to Arrays. Arrays as Function Inputs. More Secret Language: The Dreaded P Word and Pass by Reference. Functions and Multidimensional Arrays. 14. The Parallel Array Is Dead, Long Live the Structure. So What Is Structure Anyway? Introducing Dot Notation. An Array of Structures. How to Steal a Record. Putting You in the Picture. 15. The Best of Both Worlds: Structures Meet Functions. The Planets Revisited. Structures, Arrays, and Functions Join Forces. While We Are on the Subject of Functions... Running a Command-Line Program. The Program Dissected. 16. Feel You Can't Cope Anymore? Then Take Pity on the Overloaded Operator. An Explanation Is In Order. Programs for the Customer. 17. Not to Be Outdone, Meet Overloaded Functions. One Name But Many Functions. The Times Two Program. The Logic of Logical Operators. Story Time. Testing George's Theory. 18. Don't Lose Your Data: Get a Handle on File Handling. Okay, So What Is File Handling? Secondary Storage Described. One Step at a Time. Compound Files--You Know It Makes Sense. The Planets Revisited Again. Do You Like a Challenge? 19. An Introduction to Object-Oriented Programming: A Step-by-Step Guide for the Terrified. OOP: What It Can Do for You. Encapsulation Exposed. The Painless Guide to a Working Object-Oriented Program. The Queue (Q). A Spicy Q. 20. OOP, The Day of The Destructor. Jargon Buster. 21. Inheritance! OO, Things for Free. Back to the Television Set. Passing On the Family Fortune. Gaining Your Inheritance: A Step-by-Step Guide. The Mother of All Diagrams. Practically an Inheritance. It's All in the Header. A Case Study Shapes Up. A Case Study Squares Up. 22. Hail Polymorphism, The Goddess of the Design Engineer. 23. Memory Allocation and the Dreaded P Word. Variables Revised. Argh, The Pointer! The Stack. Now, The Heap. The Dynamic Array Has No Bounds. Fancy a Memory Leak? And Now for Something Completely Different. Index.

About the Author :
Paul Snaith received a degree in computer science from the Open University in the UK and a Certificate in Education from Durham. He has been a lecturer and trainer for more than 15 years, teaching computer programming, electronics, and music. Paul has a keen interest in object-oriented programming, doing work as a freelance contractor and technical trainer in several areas of the industry. In the distant past, Paul authored Pascal Made Easy, delved in to the mysteries of electronic engineering, and has been a highly unsuccessful rock star.