Section 2.5 Outputting Variables

You can output the value of a variable using the same commands we used to output simple values. The program below creates two integer variables named hour and minute, and a character variable named colon. It assigns appropriate values to each of the variables and then uses a series of output statements to generate the following:

The current time is 11:59

Run the code. After observing the output, try modifying the assignment statements to make a different time!

When we talk about “outputting a variable,” we mean outputting the value of the variable. To output the name of a variable, you have to put it in quotes. For example: cout << "hour"; The output of this statement is as follows.

hour

As we have seen before, you can include more than one value in a single output statement, which can make the previous program more concise:

On one line, this program outputs a string, two integers, a character, and the special value endl. Very impressive!

int main() {
  char a;
  char b;
  a = 'z';
  b = '8';
  cout << "a";
}

int main() {
  char a;
  char b;
  a = 'z';
  b = '8';
  cout << b;
}

int main() {
  int x;
  char y;
  x = '3';
  y = 'e';
  cout << 'y';
}

int main() {
---
 string h;
---
 char h;  #paired
---
 h = "Hello";
---
 h = Hello;  #paired
---
 cout << h;
---
 cout << "Hello";  #paired
---
 cout << "h"; 
---
}