writing a function to calculate an average

[gaga]

hi guys,
a part of my program requires me to calculate an average of items that
are sold. the easiest way to do that would be writing a function, but
im having trouble making up the parameters. if you can point me which
elements to use when performing such a task, i would really appreciate
it. thanks

[red floyd]

gaga wrote:

hi guys,
a part of my program requires me to calculate an average of items that
are sold. the easiest way to do that would be writing a function, but
im having trouble making up the parameters. if you can point me which
elements to use when performing such a task, i would really appreciate
it. thanks

You can find some advice here:
http://www.parashift.com/c++-faq-lit...t.html#faq-5.2

[Gianni Mariani]

gaga wrote:

hi guys,
a part of my program requires me to calculate an average of items that
are sold. the easiest way to do that would be writing a function, but
im having trouble making up the parameters. if you can point me which
elements to use when performing such a task, i would really appreciate
it. thanks

Average is equal to the sum of a set of values divided by the number in
the set.

In your API, how are you presented with the set of values ? Are they in
an array, a file or there is no distinct set so your computation is
disjoint over the execution ?

Anyhow, once you have the sum and the count, you can easily compute the
average with a template like so:

template <typename T>
T average( const T & sum, unsigned long count )
{
return sum / count;
}

[Wade Yin]

You can find some advice here:http://www.parashift.com/c++-faq-lit...t.html#faq-5.2

You guys are funny... :)

[James Kanze]

On Apr 6, 1:04 am, Gianni Mariani <[e-mail]:

gaga wrote:

hi guys,
a part of my program requires me to calculate an average of items that
are sold. the easiest way to do that would be writing a function, but
im having trouble making up the parameters. if you can point me which
elements to use when performing such a task, i would really appreciate
it. thanks

Average is equal to the sum of a set of values divided by the number in
the set.

In your API, how are you presented with the set of values ? Are they in
an array, a file or there is no distinct set so your computation is
disjoint over the execution ?

Anyhow, once you have the sum and the count, you can easily compute the
average with a template like so:

template <typename T>
T average( const T & sum, unsigned long count )
{
return sum / count;
}

You don't want to write a template unless you really have to.
On the other hand, this can be done in a single expression using
functions in the standard library:

average = std::accumulate( begin, end, 0.0 ) /
std::distance( begin, end ) ;

Of course, if the values are floating point, and there are more
than a very few, the results could easily be wrong. Getting an
even moderately accurate sum of a sequence of floating points is
non-trivial.

--
James Kanze (Gabi Software) email: ja*********@gmail.com
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