CptS 122 – Data Structures

Exam 2 Review Guide

This document will serve as a guide to help you prepare for the second midterm exam in CptS 122. You will find information about the exam format and topics you are expected to review within this guide.

What to Bring?

Your WSU ID

Two sharp pencils

Calculators and notes can not be used during the exam!

Exam Timeframe

Please be aware that, because you will be taking the exam during a normal lecture period, time will be extremely tight for the exam. You will be allowed to start the exam at 12:10 pm sharp. If you show up late to class, you will have less time to take the exam. You must hand your exam in by 1:00 pm. sharp. Note that, when you hand in your exam, you will be required to present your WSU ID.

Exam Format

Expect the exam to look like an hour version of quizzes, with a few more involved problems that are more in the spirit of a lab exercise. The exam will consist of some concepts questions and programming problems. For the concept section of the exam, expect true-false, fill-in-the-blank, multiple-choice, and/or short-answer questions similar to those found on the quizzes. Some of these may be similar to the questions found at the end of chapters in your textbook! For the programming problem section of the exam, I will present you with programming problems, and you will be expected to write syntactically-correct C++ code solutions that exercise good design. Note that your solutions do not have to be documented!

Exam Coverage

The exam covers the second five weeks of the semester, chapters 15 - 22 and chapter 24 of the Deitel and Deitel C How to Program textbook.

Chapter 15: Introduction to C++ and Object-Oriented Technology and Terminology

• Compare and contrast procedural programming (C) versus objected-oriented programming (C++)

• Define the term encapsulation

o Wrapping of attributes and operations into objects

• Define the term information hiding

o Implementation details are hidden within objects

• Define and apply function overloading

o Allows for functions with the same name to be defined. The key is the functions must have different parameters (number, type, order)

• What is a data member (attribute)? What is a member function (operation)?
• Define and apply function templates
• What is an inline function?
• Apply the reference (&) operator in C++, including returning references from functions
• Define pass-by-reference and pass-by-value
• What is a dangling reference?

Chapters 16 & 17: Introduction to Classes and Objects & Classes: A Deeper Look, Part 1

• Design and implement classes in C++

o What are some advantages to using classes?

• Design and apply data members and member functions for classes
• Define and apply accessor (getter) functions and mutator (setter) functions
• Define access specifier

o These include private, protected, and public

• Apply and implement default constructors, copy constructors, and destructors
• How is the size (amount of memory) of an object determined?

o We generally assume an object contains data and operations…However, each instance of an object uses the same copy of the member functions, which is separate from the object size

o Sizeof reports only the number of bytes required for a class’s data members

• What is the rule of three/Law of the Big Three/the Big Three?

o Rule of thumb in C++: should define destructor, copy constructor, and overloaded assignment operator

Chapter 18: Classes: A Deeper Look, Part 2

• Define, implement, and apply friend functions and classes

o Recall: a friend class has access to private members

• What is the this pointer? When do we need to use it?
• Apply dynamic memory management with new and delete operators
• What is a const object and const member function?
• What is class composition?

o Recall: represents a “has-a” relationship

Chapter 19: Operator Overloading

• List the operators that may not be overloaded (there are four of them…)

o Recall: precedence, associativity, and number of operands (arity) for an operator may not be changed

• Implement and apply overloaded stream insertion and extraction operators
• Implement and apply overloaded unary operators
• Implement and apply overloaded binary operators (+, -, *, /, etc.)
• Compare and contrast overloaded member operators versus non-member operators
• Define what is a forward class declaration

Chapter 20: Object-Oriented Programming: Inheritance

• What is inheritance? When should we apply it?

o Recall inheritance applies a “is-a” relationship

• Define, implement, and apply base and derived classes

o Other terms include: subclass, superclass,

• Describe when to apply the protected access specifier
• Describe the different inheritance access specifiers of C++ (i.e. public, protected, and private)
• What is single, multiple, and multilevel inheritance?

Chapter 21: Object-Oriented Programming: Polymorphism

• Define the term polymorphism
• What is a virtual function? What is a pure virtual function?
• Provide an example of when/how polymorphism should be applied
• Define abstract class and concrete class
• What is a virtual function table or vtable?

Chapter 22: Templates

• Design, implement, and apply templated classes
• What are advantages and disadvantages of templates?

Chapter 24: Exception Handling

• Define what is an exception
• Implement and apply exception handling to C++ programs
• List and identify standard library exception classes (i.e. logic_error, runtime_error, etc.) 
• Discuss when to apply exception handling

Recommended Strategy for Preparing for the Exam

    I recommend that you use the following activities and materials to prepare for the exam:

Review quizzes and lab exercises: These may well be your best resource. An excellent learning activity would be to retake the quizzes and review the lab exercises.

Lecture slides and example code: Study the lecture slides and example code.

Read the textbook: Read or re-read chapters 15 - 22 and chapter 24 in your textbook.