CS201 Some Important Definitions

For Viva Preparation

1. What is a program?
A program is a precise sequence of steps to solve a particular problem.
2. What is a class?
We write a C++ program using data members, and functions. We call this
program “class”.
3. What are data members?
The data members, functions and nested classes are called class members.
4. What is class layout?
The way in which data class members are arranged in a class object is called
class layout.
5. What is class template?
A template is used for generating class types.
6. What is comment in Programing language?
Comments are used to explain the functioning of the programs. It helps to
understand the code. C style of commenting is /*……..*/ also used in C++. And
new line oriented C++ style is //………
7. What is a constructor?
A constructor initializes the data member of an object in the scope. It has no
return type, and has the same name as class. We use many types of constructor by
overloading them.
Types of constructor:
 Default constructor/compiler generated constructor
 Simple constructor (takes no arguments)
 Parameterized constructor (takes arguments)
 Constructor overloading
 Copy constructor
8. What is destructor?
A function called when a class object goes out of scope. It cleans up the object,
freeing resources like dynamic storage. The name of the destructor is the same as
that of a class with preceding tilde sign (~). It could not be overloaded. It has no
return type, and takes no argument.

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 9. Define #include?
The #include directive instructs the preprocessor to read and include a file into a
source code file. The file name is typically enclosed with <…..> if the file is a
system provided file, or in quotes “….” if the file is user provided.
10.For which purpose we use cout?
If we want to print something on the screen we use cout (Output stream) for this
purpose.
11.What are Variables?
Variables are locations in memory for storing data. We call them variables
because they can contain different values at different times. The variable name in
C may be started with a character or an underscore ( _ ).But in C++ we did not use
underscore _ .
In a program every variable has:
 Name
 Type
 Size
 Value
12.What are data types?
A variable must have a data type associated with it. It can have data types like
integers, decimal numbers, characters etc. Different data types have different size
in memory.
13.Operators:
 Assignment operator :
“=” is used to assign a value to a specific location.
 Compound assignment operators:
“+=”
“-=”
“*=”
“/=”
“%=”
 Modulus Operator:
“%” is used to get the remainder. (For division)
 Relational Operators:
“<, =, >” used for decision making (in if statement)
“>” greater than
“==” equal to
“<” less than
“>=” greater than or equal to
“<=” less than or equal to

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 “!=” not equal to
 Logical Operators:
(These are binary operators and take two operands)
“&&” AND operator
“||” OR operator
“!” Logical Negation
 Increment and decrement operator:
“++” Increment operator (unary operator) that increase the
value of its operator by 1.
“- -(with no space between)“ decrement operator that decrease the
value by 1.
 Address operator:
“&” to get the address of a memory location.
14.What is operator overloading?
Operator overloading is to allow the same operator to be bound to more than
one implementation, depending on the types of the operands.
15.What is if statement?
The statement used for decision in “C” language is known as the “if statement”
it also called conditional statement. It has a simple structure:
If(condition)
Statement (or group of statements)
For example:
If(Ali’s height is greater than six feet)
Ali can be a member of team
16.What is “if/else statement structure?
If(condition){
statement(s);
}else{
Statement(s);
}
17.When we use switch statement?
The switch structure is a multiple-selection construct that is used in multi way
decisions to make the code more efficient and easy to understand. Multi decision
means a condition where we have to use if else statement again and again so for
ease to access we use switch statement.
In switch statement there should be an integer variable or an expression which
must evaluate an integer type. We can‟t use compound conditions (conditions that
use logical operators “&&, ||” in switch statement).

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 18.What is break statement?
The break statement interrupts the flow of control. In switch statement all
statements are executed. But we want that only statements of true case should be
executed and remaining should be skipped. For this purpose we use break
statement.
Syntax of switch and break statement:
switch(variable/expression){
case constant1: statement 1;
break;
case constant2: statement2;
break;
……………………………………
case constantN: statmentN;
break;
default: statement;
}
19.What is the purpose of “continue” statement?
Continue statement is related to loop. When we have lot of code in the body of
loop and we need some code to be executed every time and some code in certain
cases. For this purpose we use continue statement. It one line statement like break
statement.
continue;
The statements of the loop body after continue are not executed. And loop
starts from the next iteration when a continue statement is encountered in the body
of the loop.
20.When will be used “while” Loop?
“While” means “do it until the condition is true”. Use of “while” construct can
be helpful in repeating of a set of instructions under some condition.
The syntax of while construct is:
while(logical expression){
statement 1;
statement 2;
statement 3;
…………
}
21.What is the difference between “while” and “do-while loop”?
In “while loop” the condition is tested first and the statement in the body
executed only when the condition is true, the loop can executed zero or more
times.

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 In “do-while loop” condition is tested after execution the statement of the loop
body. Thus, the loop body executed at least once and then the condition in do while
stamen is tested.
Syntax of do while Loop:
do{
statement(s);
}
while(condition);
22.What we do in the loop?
There are three things we do in a loop:
i. Initialize a variable.
ii. A continuation / termination condition
iii. Changing the value of the condition variable, usually the increment of the
variable value.
The syntax of for loop:
for(initialize condition; continuation condition; incrementing condition)
{
statement(s);
}
23.What are functions?
Functions are like subtasks. They receive some information, do some process
and provide a result.
There are two categories of function:
 Functions that returns a value
 Functions that do not return a value.
Structure of Functions:
Structure of function Example
return-data-type function-name(argument- int square(int number){
list){ int result = 0;
declarations and statements result = number*number;
} return result;
}

Functions which don‟t return any value use keyword “void” instead of
return-data-type. The default data type of functions is int.
24.What is the calling methodology of a function?
The calling program just needs to write the function name and provide its
arguments without data types.

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 25.What is the difference between declaration and definition of a function?
Declaration and definition are both different things. Declaration is a prototype
of the function, that includes the return type, name and argument list to the
function and definition is the actual function code.

Declaration Definition
Int square (int) Int square(int number){
Return (number * number);
}

26.What is the difference between “call by value” and “call by reference”?

Call by Value:
In call by value we pass a copy of arguments instead of original variables.
The copy reaches to the function that uses it and returns it back to the calling
function. (C language use call by value by default).
Call by Reference:
In call by reference we pass the reference of original variable. And use
original variable.
27.What is array?
Array is a special data type. Arrays can be used to store a collection of data of
same data type. Every array has a data type name and size. Arrays start from index
0.
Declaration:
Data-type array-name[size];
For example:
Int ages[10];
We can initialize an array using “loop” while assigning some value.
28.Define keyword “const”.
The keyword “const” is the construct. If we want to change the size of an array
suppose from 10 to 100 we can use this keyword to deal this situation. It can be
used for any data type and is written before the data type as:
const int arraySize = 100;
Whenever we use the word key word const the value of that variable
becomes constant and no other value can be assigned to it later on.
29.How we can manipulate arrays?
We can manipulate arrays using loops.
30.What are pointers?
Pointers are a special type of variables in which a memory address is stored.
(They contain memory address not the value of the variable). Pointers works by
pointing to a particular data type i.e. int, char, double, float etc.

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The syntax of declaring a pointer is:
Data type *name;
For example
int *myptr;
One of the major usages of pointers is to simulate call by reference while
using it with function calls. In the calling function, we pass the address of the
variable to a function being called by using & operator.
31.What is bubble sort?
It is a technique of comparing two values and interchanging the larger and
smaller values. To interchange the position of larger and smaller values, the
technique of swapping is used.
32.What is the relationship between pointers and arrays?
The name of array is a constant pointer which contains the memory address of
the first element of the array.
33.What is the role of a back slash (\) in C and C++?
Whenever a back slash (\) is used, the compiler consider both the characters as
single (also known as escape characters).
“\n” for new line
“\t” for tab
“\0” null
34.What do you know about <ctype.h>?
C language provides any functions to perform useful tests and manipulations of
character data. These functions are found in the header file <ctype.h>.
35.What do you know about <stdlib.h>?
The header file stdlib.h includes functions, used for different conversions.
These conversion functions take an argument of a type and return it after
converting into another type.
36.Which header file we use for file handling in our programs?
Whenever using files in our programs, we will include this header file
<fstream.h>.
37.What is a structure?
“A structure is a collection of variables under a single name. These variables
can be of different types, and each has a name that is used to select it from the
structure”. It is defined with the key word struct.
(Keyword “struct” cannot be used as variable.)
38.What is static memory allocation?
When we write the things like int i, j, k these will reserve three integers in
memory. Similarly the typing of char s[20] will result in the allocation of space for
20characters in the memory. This type of memory allocation is called static

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allocation. It is also called compile time allocation. Static memory runs
essentially on stack.
We use this type of allocation when we know how much memory is required.
39.What is dynamic memory allocation?
Instead of allocating static memory with in code, we can ask how much memory is
required to allocate. And allocate memory at runtime (dynamically). This type of
memory allocation is used when we don‟t know how much memory exactly we
required. The dynamic memory allocation use memory from heap.
40.Which functions are used for memory allocation in C?
“calloc()”, “malloc()” and “realloc()” functions are used for memory
allocation in C.
41.For which purpose Function “free()” is used?
The memory allocated is no longer in use, we use free() function to free that
memory and make it a part of heap again.
42.How memory allocated in C++?
The memory allocation in C++ is carried out with the use of an operator called
“new operator”, and deallocated with the “delete operator”. That memory
returned back to free store. Whenever we use “new operator” to allocate memory,
it will be necessary to use of “delete operator” to deallocate the memory.
43.What is dangling pointer?
The pointer points to no memory location is called dangling pointer.
It has inverse effect of memory leak. A pointer was pointing to a chunk of
memory, now by some reason that memory has deallocated and has gone back to
heap. The pointer still has the starting address of that chunk. Now pointer is
pointing to a memory that no longer belongs to the program and gone back to the
heap.
44.Define static variable also explain life time of static variable?
Static variable means maintaining the state of a variable. It exists and lives
around even when we are outside the function. It is created and initialized only
once during the lifetime of the program and therefore it will be destroyed or taken
out of memory only once during the lifetime of the program.
45.What is different between pointers and variable?
Normal variable contains the value of variable either int or float whereas
pointer variable contains the address of another variable.
46.How many types of templates?
There are two different types of templates in C++ language i.e.‟ function
templates and class templates.

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 47.Define buffer?
A program that writes the output data to the disc, it will be nice to collect the
output data (numbers) and write it on the disc in one write operation instead of
writing the numbers one by one. The area where we gather the numbers is known
as buffer.
48.What is function overloading?
In function overloading, the functions have the same name but differ either by the
number of arguments or the type of the arguments.
49.What is the keyword „this‟ and what are the uses of „this‟ pointer?
'This' is used to refer the current class member without using the name of the
class. We cannot use it as a variable name. „this’ pointer is present in the function,
referring to the calling object. “this” pointer points to the current object.

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