First thoughts on C/C++ course

Details of C/C++ course 3C59

Draft 5: Revised 18/11/2000 printed: 08/01/01

Title:
Scientific Programming using Object Oriented Languages

Aims of the course

The aim of this course is to give the student an introduction to the use of object oriented programming in the context of physics data handling and analysis situations .

Implementation is mainly in C++. Through this course the student should learn enough to be able to design and implement simple analysis programs such as would arise in 3^rd year laboratories and 3^rd and 4^th year project work.

In addition the course also aims to give an introduction to the use of Java if time permits.

Objectives

The specific objectives of the course are that the student will become familiar with

In-built data types & their manipulation

User defined data types: classes and objects

Manipulation of objects using methods.

Constructors and destructors

Input and output

Organisation of lists and other collections of objects including use of the STL (Standard Template Library)

Algorithm steering elements

Approaches to problem analysis and design

Method overolading

Inheritance, polymorphism and interfaces

Putting a program together

Application to physics laboratory based problems

Module and syllabus summary

Module	Theme
Basic modules
1	Inbuilt data types (int, float, char...) Manipulations of inbuilt data types Simple functions
2	User defined data types ( classes ) Objects as instances of a class Manipulation of object member variables Operations on objects: Methods Data encapsulation
3	Algorithm steering elements (if, switch, for, while, do)
4	I/O -Screen and keyboard: cin >>, cout << - File i/o
5	Handling collections of objects: -An introduction to the vector class
Consolidation exercise1 - part 1: Formulating the first few classes of the Compton analysis problem
Technical	Some technical topics: code organisation into .h and .cpp files the C pre-processor references const variables and references scope
7	Constructors and Destructors
Consolidation exercise1 - part 2: Completing the Compton analysis program
Technical	Pointers - pointers - allocation of memory with new and delete - the important use of destructors - this->
8	More on methods: - overloading of methods - self messaging - const methods and arguments
9	Operator overloading
Consolidation exercise2 Design and implementat of a Monte Carlo program to simulate the Compton scattering experiment
Technical	Some more Technical topics: - more scope (nested types) - namespaces - typedef
10	Inheritance
11	Polymorphism and vitual methods
12	The String class
Advanced modules
20 (16old)	STL-1 - Containers: (vector, list....) - Iterators
21	Template classes
22	STL-2 - Use of generic algorithms on STL containers - The map container
23	Interface programming
24	Type conversion - via constructors - via conversion operators - casting - implicit conversion
Advanced modules (not in 2000/01)
25	Exception handling
26	Design Patterns
Design Modules
D1	Towards Object Oriented thinking Classes are more than for just data entities
D2 (old4)	Formal Object Oriented analysis and design
Java Modules
J1	Introduction to Java

Module and syllabus details
Details of the aims of each module, and the material covered by each can be found in:

OOCoourse_details.pdf