Description
This homework will give you more practice in writing functions and also how numbers are read
into a variable. You need to write a function that will read an unsigned integer into a variable of
type unsigned short int. This will have a maximum value of 65535, and the function needs to
take care of illegal numbers. You can not use “cin >>”, inside the function.
The rules for numeric input are basically as follows:
1) skip all leading white spaces
2) first character found must be numeric else an error will occur
3) numeric characters are then processed one at a time and combine with number
4) processing stops when non-numeric found
We will follow these rules and also add error handling and overflow. If an illegal entry is made
before a numeric than an error code of “1” will be sent back, if overflow occurs, that is number
bigger then 65535, then error code of “2” will be sent back. If no error then “0” is sent back.
Make sure the main function will continue to loop until the user enters a “n” or “N” for NO, the
main should test the error code returned from the function called “ReadInt” and display
appropriate error messages or display the number if there is no error. Take care in designing the
“ReadInt” function, it should be value returning and have a reference parameter. The function
needs to process one character at a time from the input buffer and deal with it in a correct
fashion. Once the number has been read in, then make sure the input buffer is empty, otherwise
the loop in main may not work correct. I know this is not how the extraction works, but lets do it
this way.
You do not need to turn in an algorithm with this assignment, but I would advise you to write
one. And the debugger may prove helpful as well. You are basically rewriting the extraction
operator as it works on integers.
