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Improving functionality

Java Syntax, Level 5, Lesson 12

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Help me, it works.

Current implementation: The program reads two numbers from the keyboard and displays the minimum.
New task: The program reads five numbers from the keyboard and displays the minimum.

Requirements:

The program should read the numbers from the keyboard.
The class must have a public static void main method.
The class must have a public static min method that takes 5 int arguments.
The min method must return the minimum of the 5 passed numbers. If there are several minimum numbers, return any of them.
The program should display a string that starts with "Minimum = ".
The program should display a string that ends with the minimum of the 5 entered numbers.

package com.codegym.task.task05.task0531; import java.io.BufferedReader; import java.io.InputStreamReader; /* Improving functionality */ public class Solution { public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception { BufferedReader reader = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(System.in)); int a = Integer.parseInt(reader.readLine()); int b = Integer.parseInt(reader.readLine()); int c = Integer.parseInt(reader.readLine()); int d = Integer.parseInt(reader.readLine()); int e = Integer.parseInt(reader.readLine()); int minimum = min(a, b ,c ,d ,e); System.out.println("Minimum = " + minimum); } public static int min(int a, int b, int c, int d , int e) { if(a < b && a <c && a< d && a<e) return a; else if(b <a && b< c && b< d && b<e) return b; else if(c <a && c< b && c < d && c< e) return c; else if(d <a && d<b && d<c && d<e) return d; else return e; } }

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Guadalupe Gagnon

Level 37 , Tampa, United States

9 April 2019, 18:30

solution

Your program doesn't check for equality. If you enter 5,5,6,7,52248 the output would be 52248. The '>' greater than and '<' less than operators will return false if a == b. This is causing all you if statements to return false when two numbers are the same. This means that 'e' will be returned no matter how ridiculously not minimum it is.

Connor

Level 8 , Boston, United States

30 April 2019, 01:21

Hey my friend! Could you use the replacement method to find the minimum like in the past tasks? if ( a > b){ int temp = a; a = b; b = temp; } if (b < c){ int temp = b; b = c; c = temp; } and so on, and then print a?

Guadalupe Gagnon

Level 37 , Tampa, United States

30 April 2019, 13:08

What you just shared looks like a sort method. You do not need to swap the values around, i think what you mean is this:

if (a > b) a = b;
if (a > c) a = c;
//and so on......

Connor

Level 8 , Boston, United States

30 April 2019, 14:49

That is what I mean! I'm still grasping exactly what these do. The difference still seems small and nuanced in the code at first glance to me. So I made a bunch of letter and symbol magnets and flashcards to stick on my whiteboard so that I can physically go through the process the computer does and see it step by step lol. It has really helped my brain to comprehend EXACTLY what is happening.

Guadalupe Gagnon

Level 37 , Tampa, United States

30 April 2019, 16:12

When i first started learning programming I had a notebook where would write down blocks of code then use different colored highlighters to separate keywords, variables, values, and a whole bunch of other things as new concepts were introduced. The colors were broken up into code that was part of the 'language' and code that was user generated, such as variable names. I added a whole bunch of cliff notes I have no idea where any of that is now and it became a large convoluted mess. I'm not saying it wasn't helpful, especially at the time, but the thing that helped me the most was practice. I really didn't understand programming to the level I am at now until codegym with their tasks. I have completed just around 800 of them so far. One thing that I can recommend that you start doing is putting print and println methods around your code to output information on what is going on. This helps you step through the code instead of staring at it for 20 minutes trying to figure out intuitively what will happen, for example:

if ( a > b){
   system.out.print("a was greater than b, swapping values: ");
   int temp = a;
   a = b;
   b = temp;
   system.out.println("a now equals: " + a + " and b now equals: " + b);
}
if (b < c){
   system.out.print("b was greater than c, swapping values: ");
   int temp = b;
   b = c;
   c = temp;
   system.out.println("b now equals: " + b + " and c now equals: " + c);
}

You can then run your code and follow the output and compare it to what you actually want your code to do. Typically I find I have great ideas on how to solve problems, but my first (and sometimes second, third, fourth etc) attempts to code that idea just doesn't fully come out the way I envision. I use this and run the code as many times as I need until it works as expected. Make sure you delete those lines before trying to validate though.