The main goals for this lab are:
Starting in this lab, you will need to have a TA check off on all your exercises.
This lab is a paired programming assignment. What exactly does that mean? You will be working in pairs on the CS lab computers. Each pair will be working on one computer. One person will be the driver and the other person will be the navigator. Here is the rule: the driver controlls the lab computer, but the driver can only type what the navigator tells them to type. For this to work well, each pair should be constantly talking among themselves. After each problem, you will switch roles, the navigator will become the driver and the driver will become the navigator.
For students who took CS113 in Spring ‘23 and Fall ‘24, you have already completed a version of this lab. However, you must still complete this lab as a refresher.
While editing code, you will invariably have typos or misspellings that will lead to syntax errors. You will notice that code will not compile until all syntax errors are corrected. Tune yourself to the Java syntax so that whenever you write a Java program (whether on paper, in VIM, or an IDE) you are always writing correct syntax. This will help improve your understanding of Java as well as save you time during implementation.
Once you have a complete program free of syntax errors, it is time to try and run it. Programs rarely run correctly the first time. There are always bugs. Your program may successfully run to completion, but it may produce incorrect results. This is may be due to faulty logic in your code. You will have to examine the program or its output and fix it. Later, we will learn ways to test your programs to minimize these errors.
Often, during program execution, you will run into errors due to which your program will crash! This happens very often during development and it is important to learn to recognize the cause of errors so that you can fix them. Runtime errors that result in program crashes typically print out the cause of the error, including the line on which the error occurred, in the Java Console. These may appear cryptic at first, but it is time to try and understand them.
The best way to understand runtime errors is to write code that crashes!
Exercise 1: Create the following program:
public class Crash1 {
static int[] a = { 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 };
public static void main(String[] args) {
for (int i = 0; i < a.length; i++) {
System.out.println(a[i]);
}
System.out.println("Done printing the array!");
}
}
Run the program. This is the correct version. You will get the output shown below.
10
20
30
40
50
Done printing the array!
Now, let’s break it. Ready?
Change the termination test in the for-loop to the following:
i <= a.length
Exercise 1.1: Can you tell what’s going to happen? Why?
Run the program.
10
20
30
40
50
Exception in thread "main" java.lang.ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException: 5
at Crash1.main(Crash1.java:7)
After printing out the last element in the array, it got the error. Why? Did you guess correctly? If you didnt, thats ok, remember that a mistake or being wrong is an opportunity to learn! There is no shame in being wrong, that means you get to grow! There is only shame in not trying.
Let’s try and parse the error message. Runtime errors are typically called exceptions in Java. If you read the first line, it is telling you that there was an exception in the thread “main”. Remember that in Java, exceptions are an object.
What is a thread? This is a technical term. In computing, each set of instructions running on the computer is called a thread. At any point there could be several threads of computation running. So, this exception occurred in the “main” thread (that is your main() method). In more advanced classes you will learn how to write code that runs multiple threads at once, thats were you become super powerful!
Further, it is also telling you that the error, or exception, that occurred is a known type of error. It is called java.lang.ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException. Just by looking at the name, you should be able to guess that this is an object of some kind. It belongs to the java.lang class and its name is:
ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException
And, that is exactly the error we introduced when we changed the termination test. We let the loop run beyond the bounds of the array, to an index 5, which in an array of five elements does not exist. Right?
In fact, the index number that caused the exception is also shown (:5), as is the line at which the exception occurred:
Crash1.main(Crash1.java:7)
That is, at line 8 of Crash1.java (your source code) was where you tried to access an array element that doesn’t exist. This is line 8:
System.out.println(a[i]);
Since i=5 and a[5] does not exist, you get the ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException.
Java includes an elaborate set of classes that define various exceptions. Moreover, when these exceptions occur (technically, when an exception is raised/thrown) it also gives you an option to write your programs so that you include code to handle (or catch) some exceptions. This is called exception handling. In many instances, as you will soon see, you are required to provide code for handling anticipated exceptions. We will learn how to handle exceptions next.
Java has a class called Exception and several dozen types of exceptions that can arise are defined as subclasses of the Exception class. Some of the errors occur during input/output (for example, a broken network connection, or a misplaced input file, etc.) and others during the course of executing your logic (for example an out of bounds array access, or trying to access an object before instantiation, etc.). Sometimes, it is possible to recover from an error and to do this Java provides a way for you to detect and specify corrective measures.
Java provides a try-catch statement block to detect and handle exceptions. Its basic syntax is shown below:
try {
…some code during whose execution errors may occur…
} catch (<some exception> <variable>) {
…some corrective action you could perform…
}
Essentially, you enclose the code that may (or is likely to) result in an error in a try-catch statement block as shown. If, in the course of executing the surrounded code an exception occurs, the code included in the catch-block is executed. The following exercise illustrates this.
Exercise 2: Write a program to input a number and output its square root.
Create a new program with the code shown below.
import java.util.*;
public class Crash2 {
public static void main(String[] args) {
Scanner in = new Scanner(System.in);
while (true) {
System.out.print("Enter a number: ");
String line = in.nextLine();
int data = Integer.parseInt(line);
System.out.println("Square root of " + data + " is " + Math.sqrt(data));
}
} // main()
} // end of class
The code shown above repeatedly prompts the user for a number and then computes and outputs the square root of that number. The number is actually input as a string, as you have learned earlier. You use the Java function:
Integer.parseInt(<string>)
to extract a number from the input string. There is also a Double.parseDouble() if you want to accept floating-point input.
The while-loop ensures that the program does this forever. Run the program and enter some numbers to try it out. Enter only positive integer values at first. Then, after a few successful tries, enter something that’s not a number. What happens?
Exception in thread "main" java.lang.NumberFormatException: null
at java.lang.Integer.parseInt(Integer.java: 454)
at java.lang.Integer.parseInt(Integer.java 527)
at InputErrorDemo.main(Crash2.java:9)
Can you guess why that happens?
Notice, the error is occurring at line 9 of your program. That is the line where you are trying to convert the string to an integer. The exception flagged, java.lang.NumberFormatException, is indicating that there was a problem in the number format: it wasn’t a number that you entered.
To handle this, we need Java’s exception handling.
try-catch StatementExercise 3: Read and understand the code below to see how a try-catch block is structured, and used. Modify your program to work this way and experiment with it.
import java.util.*;
public class Crash2 {
public static void main(String[] args) {
while(true) {
Scanner in = new Scanner(System.in);
try {
System.out.print("Enter a number: ");
String line = in.nextLine();
double data = Double.parseDouble(line);
System.out.println("The square root of " + data + " is " + Math.sqrt(data));
}
catch(NumberFormatException e) {
System.out.println("That's not a number!");
}
}
}
}
Run the above program several times. Enter integer values, floating point values, as well as other garbage. Notice how your program is now robust enough to do the right thing when a number is input, and recovers in situations when nothing or some non-numeric input is provided. It does not crash!
Scanner classAssignments in this course will typically deal with lots of data. This data will often be read by your program from a data file. In life, you might often work on problems with lots of data. For example, if you are building a self-driving car, you will needs millions of data points.
Java has several ways to access files and read data from them. The Scanner class is one of the simplest.
Exercise 4: Write a program that reads a text file and prints out is contents. First, create a small data file with a few lines of text. I used these, from a random tweet:
@LiamNeeson
I always wanted to be a cowboy
And Jedi Knights
6
Are basically cowboys in space
Right?
Save the file (I named mine LiamNeeson.txt). Now that you have a text file to read, we can build a program that reads and prints out its contents. In order to read text from a file, one line at a time, you do the following:
Import the java.io and java.util packages:
import java.io.Scanner;
import java.util.File;
Create a new Scanner object linked to the data file using the File class in Java:
Scanner input = new Scanner (new File(<name of input file>));
Use the hasNextLine() and nextLine() methods to look for and read the next line:
while(input.hasNextLine()) {
String line = input.nextLine();
...
}
Close the input stream:
input.close();
Further, the Scanner class forces that you enclose the entire operation in a try-catch block. This is because in the process of opening the file (Step 2) and testing and reading from it (Step 3), things could go wrong. For instance, the file may not exist, or you typed its name or location incorrectly, etc. The program below puts all these together to show how to read text from a file and then output its contents to the console.
import java.io.File;
import java.io.FileNotFoundException;
import java.util.Scanner;
public class TextIO {
public static void main(String[] args) {
String inFileName = "LiamNeeson.txt";
Scanner input;
String line;
try {
// Create a new Scanner for the input file
input = new Scanner(new File(inFileName));
while (input.hasNextLine()) { // test if there is a line to read
// read the next line
line = input.nextLine();
// output it to Console
System.out.println(line);
}
// Close the input stream
input.close();
}
catch (FileNotFoundException e) {
System.out.println("Error in opening the file:" + inFileName);
System.exit(1);
}
}
}
Run the program. Did you see the contents of the text file in the console? If not, what went wrong? Once it is running correctly, deliberately change the name of the file and run the program. What do you see? Exceptions at work!
What if you don’t want to catch an exception for whatever reason and just letting your program crash? After all, you were getting that ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException all the time when you were learning arrays and have never heard of try/catch, right? However, sometimes Java insists that certain exceptions MUST be either caught or raised. This means that you cannot simply do nothing. If you prefer to not catch an exception and let your program crash, Java wants you to declare it by throwing the exception (to show that you are aware of it).
FileNotFoundException is such an exception.
Take out the try/catch block above, save and compile. What happens? You will get the following compilation error:
TextIO.java:11: error: unreported exception FileNotFoundException;
must be caught or declared to be thrown
input = new Scanner(new File(inFilename));
^
1 error
The compilation can be allowed to go forward by having the method in which the exception is generated – in this case main to declare throwing that particular exception:
public static void main(String[] args) throws FileNotFoundException
Make this change now and try it.
In todays lab we covered Exceptions and Reading Files. You will be using what we covered today throughout the semester.
Before leaving, make sure your TA/instructor have signed you out of the lab. If you finish the lab early, you are free to go. If you do not finish the lab in time, you will need to go to office hours so that a TA can check your work.