Roxy

Ok I thought structures were hard but decisions are horrible. Really confused on the if then else, and or, and when and how to understand when they are used. For example:
if department < 3 then
raise = SMALL_RAISE
else
if department < 5
raise = MEDIUM_RAISE
else
raise = BIG_RAISE
end if
end if

So would this be a SMALL_RAISE, MEDIUM_RAISE. or BIG_RAISE and why?

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jcjacob

Roxy, what this is saying is:

assuming the department number are positive integers,

If you work in departments, 0, 1 or 2, you will get a SMALL_RAISE
If you work in department 4 you will get a MEDIUM_RAISE
If your department is 5 or anything higher, you will get a BIG_RAISE

Why:
a SMALL_RAISE is given if your department is LESS THAN 3 (0, 1 or 2)
a MEDIUM_RAISE is LESS THAN 5, but since 0, 1 and 2 were taken care of by the first IF, that only leaves 4
If your department is anything else (5 or greater) it is assigned BIG_RAISE by the last ELSE which catches all other conditions.

Make sense?

__________________
-John

Roxy

Yes that does make sense. Why couldn't you be my teacher???? I appreciate your help and hope you don't think I am to dumb.

jcjacob

Glad to be of help Roxy.
The problem with learning structured programming is that we learn to process lots of information simultaneously to make decisions (sight, sound, touch, smell, etc.). In programming, the computer only executes one single instruction at a time, so breaking everything down to it's most basic component can be a challenge. It just takes practice so stick with it and you'll be fine.

The only dumb question is the one you never ask.

__________________
-John