Programming 1
Lecture 4 – Arrays & Loops
Faculty of Information Technology
Hanoi University
Section 1
Arrays in Java
The array structure
• At times, we have to handle a lot of values and
declaring too many variables is not a good option
• So they gave programming languages a tool to group
many values into one variable called array
• We can do something like this:
int[] a = {6, 2, 15, 4, 11};
System.out.println(a[0] + a[2]); // 6 + 15
• We call the values by their 0 1 2 3 4
position in the array
6 2 15 4 11
• Position starts from 0
Declare arrays
int[] a;
double[] b;
String[] names;
• If you declare them like this, they will be null
• null is the value of an object which hasn't been
initialized yet
String s; // s is null
Scanner sc; // sc is also null
Scanner sc2 = new Scanner(System.in);
// sc2 got initialized and isn't null
sc = new Scanner(System.in);
s = "Hello";
// sc and s are initialized
Initialize arrays
int[] a = new int[10];
• An array of 10 zeros
double[] b = new double[5];
• A double array of 5 zeros
String[] names = new String[3];
• An array of 3 null values
→ Reason: The default value for int and double is 0
and for String is null
Initialize arrays with values
int[] a = {2, 4, 6};
• An array of 3 numbers
double[] b = {0.2, 0.4, 0.1, -0.13, 0.9};
• An array of 5 real numbers
String[] names = {"Ha", "Tu", "Hoa"};
• An array of 3 strings
Getting array length
int[] a = {2, 4, 6};
System.out.println(a.length); // 3
double[] b = {0.2, 0.4, 0.1, -0.13, 0.9};
System.out.println(b.length); // 5
String[] names = new String[10];
System.out.println(names.length); // 10
→ Array length can be automatically determined (based on
initialized values) or specified on declaration
Arrays and the for loop
• Arrays are most useful when combined with
the for loop
double[] b = {0.2, 0.4, 0.1, -0.13, 0.9};
for (int i = 0; i < b.length; i++) {
System.out.println("#" + i + ": " + b[i]);
}
Result
#0: 0.2
#1: 0.4
#2: 0.1
#3: -0.13
#4: 0.9
Multi-Dimensional Arrays
• Example of a two-dimensional array:
• Above is an array of 5 rows and 10 columns.
– 5 is the length of the first dimension
– 10 is the length of the second dimension
• An array can have many dimensions.
– High-dimensional arrays (e.g. 4D, 5D… are difficult
to visualize)
2D array declaration
Accessing 2D array
elements
Loop through a 2D array
for (int i = 0; i < counts.length; i++) {
for (int j = 0; j < counts[i].length; j++) {
// do something with counts[i][j]
}
}
Section 2
MORE ABOUT LOOPS
How to stop a for loop
• When we search for something with a for
loop, we may want to stop looking as soon as
it is found.
• E.g. Find one negative number from an array
such as: int[] a = {6,4,-2,6,5,9,15,-6,2};
for (int i = 0; i < a.length; i++) {
if (a[i] < 0) {
System.out.println("Found: " + a[i]);
}
}
What is the output of the above piece of code?
How to stop a for loop
int[] a = {6, 4, -2, 6, 5, 9, 15, -6, 2};
for (int i = 0; i < a.length; i++) {
if (a[i] < 0) {
System.out.println("Found: " + a[i]);
}
}
Output:
Found: -2
Found: -6
• This piece of code found 2 negative numbers but only one is
required.
• After -2 is found at the 3rd iteration, the loop continues to run
until it finishes after 9 iterations.
• It should've stopped at the 3rd iteration.
How to stop a for loop
int[] a = {6, 4, -2, 6, 5, 9, 15, -6, 2};
for (int i = 0; i < a.length; i++) {
if (a[i] < 0) {
System.out.println("Found: " + a[i]);
break;
}
}
Output:
Found: -2
• The break statement terminates an on-going for loop.
• break affects the loop which immediately contains it.
How to stop a for loop
for (int i = 0; i < 10; i++) {
for (int j = 0; j < 10; j++) {
if (i * j > 30) {
System.out.println(i + "," + j);
break; // out of j loop
}
}
}
Output:
4,8
5,7
6,6
7,5
8,4
9,4
How to stop a for loop
for (int i = 0; i < 10; i++) {
for (int j = 0; j < 10; j++) {
if (i * j > 30) {
System.out.println(i + "," + j);
}
}
if (i == 4) break; // out of i loop
}
Output:
4,8
4,9
The while loop
• Repeat a block of code as long as a condition holds true
• The number of iterations is not specific and can be zero
The loop stops when loop condition is false
int n = 0;
while (n < 10) {
block of
System.out.println("n = " + n);
code to
n++; repeat
}
while loop explained
int n = 1, e = 0;
while (n < 10) {
What is the output?
n = n * 2;
e++;
}
System.out.println("2^" + e + " = " + n);
• Let n = 1, e = 0
• Now n < 10 is true, let's continue the loop.
• Execute n = n * 2 and e++ → n becomes 2, e becomes 1
• The condition n < 10 is still true, let's continue the loop.
• Execute n = n * 2 and e++ → n becomes 4, e becomes 2
• The condition n < 10 is still true, let's continue the loop.
• Execute n = n * 2 and e++ → n becomes 8, e becomes 3
• The condition n < 10 is still true, let's continue the loop.
• Execute n = n * 2 and e++ → n becomes 16, e becomes 4
• Finally n < 10 is false, the loop ends.
while loop flowchart
while loop flowchart
while (i < n) {
print(i);
i++;
}
The do…while loop
• Repeat a block of code once, and then continues as long
as a condition holds true
• The number of iterations is not specific but always >= 1
int n = 0;
do { block of
System.out.println("n = " + n); code to
n++; repeat
} while (n < 10);
The loop stops when loop condition is false
do…while loop explained
int n;
do {
System.out.print("Enter a positive integer: ");
n = sc.nextInt();
} while (n <= 0);
System.out.println("Thank you!");
• Let n be uninitialized
• Print a text message to ask user to enter a positive integer.
• Get n's value from the keyboard with sc.nextInt() method.
• Repeat if the user does not obey you.
do…while loop flowchart
Stop a while loop with break
• Similar to the for loop, the while loop can be
terminated with the break statement.
while (n < 10) {
if (sc.nextLine().equals("q")) {
System.out.println("Goodbye!");
break;
}
n++;
}
Skip the rest of an iteration with continue
• Similar to the for loop, an iteration of a while loop and
do…while loop can be interrupted with continue
int n = 0;
while (n < 3) {
n++;
System.out.println(n);
if (n == 2) continue;
System.out.println("...hi");
}
Output:
1
...hi
2
3
...hi
Example
• Replace all spaces in a string with underscores.
Answer 1
String s = "To infinity and beyond!";
for (int i = 0; i < s.length(); i++) {
if (s.charAt(i) == ' ') {
System.out.print("_");
} else {
System.out.print(s.charAt(i));
}
}
System.out.println(); // add a new line at the end
Comment: This solution uses a lot of print statements.
Answer 2
String s = "There's a snake in my boot!";
String s2 = "";
for (int i = 0; i < s.length(); i++) {
if (s.charAt(i) == ' ') {
s2 = s2 + "_"; // this creates a new String
} else {
s2 = s2 + s.charAt(i); // same as above
}
}
System.out.println(s2);
Comment: This solution creates a lot of String objects, which is
computationally expensive.
while loop example
• Consider a while loop to calculate money
investment.
FlowChart
of the code
example
While loop trace table
year interest balance balance < targetBalance (200)
0 N/A 100.00 TRUE
1 7.30 107.30 TRUE
2 7.83 115.13 TRUE
3 8.40 123.54 TRUE
4 9.02 132.56 TRUE
5 9.68 142.23 TRUE
6 10.38 152.62 TRUE
7 11.14 163.76 TRUE
8 11.95 175.71 TRUE
9 12.83 188.54 TRUE
10 13.76 202.30 FALSE
While loop debugging text
• Print out the values to trace them.
– Useful when dealing with loop problems.
Common mistakes with Loops
for (int i = 1; i < 10; i++);
{
System.out.println(i);
}
int n = 1;
while (n < 10);
{
System.out.println(n);
n++;
}
• Do not put a semicolon (;) at the end of a for
loop or while loop's header
for loop initialization & update
• A for loop can perform more than one initialization and
update
– Simply separate the actions with commas (,)
• Examples:
2 variables are initialized
for (n = 1, product = 1; n <= 10; n++)
product = product * n;
2 variables are updated
for (i = 1, n = 1; i < 10; n = n * i, i++) {
// ...
}
Example
• Calculate the square root of a number without a
built-in function (such as Math.sqrt())
• Newton’s method of approximation
– Let the number be N and the desirable square root be S
– At first, guess that S is 1
– If S = N / S then S is the square root of N
– If not, the next guess is the average of S and N / S
– Continue while the next guess is still different from the
previous guess
Answer (Newton’s approximation method)
double n = 50, s = 1, prev_s;
do {
prev_s = s; // save the previous guess
System.out.println(prev_s);
s = (s + n / s) / 2; // update the guess
} while (prev_s != s); // stop if 2 guesses are the same
System.out.println("Result: " + s);
Output:
1.0
25.5
13.730392156862745
8.685974371897991
7.221190474331159
7.072628275743689
7.071067984011346
7.071067811865477
7.0710678118654755
Result: 7.0710678118654755
