OBJECTIVES:

The objective of this assignment is to provide you with some programming experience, using the Microsoft Visual Basic programming language. In addition to the material presented in the course texts (CSC104 Course Package and optionally the Essentials of Visual Basic 6.0 Programming) the information you need to finish this assignment will be provided during your lectures in the coming weeks. Should you require more information, you may be able to find additional Visual Basic references in a library.
 

SCENARIO

Your client is the developer of a well-known GUI Operating System whose target market is the world of personal computers and workstations. In order to make their OS even more competitive in the market, they have decided to include several tools/utilities, including one that allows embedded software developers to easily convert integers to/from the binary, octal and decimal number systems.
 

YOUR ASSIGNMENT

Your project is to write a Visual Basic program that would read in a positive integer from the user, allow the user to specify the base of this integer, and then translate this integer to a different base, also specified by the user. The result of this conversion will then be displayed for the user.

Although the scope of this project is only the conversion of positive integers from binary, octal or decimal to one of the other two bases, you may not make any assumptions about the nature of the user's input. Therefore, your program should behave gracefully when the user enters invalid input. This would mean that instead of your program crashing under such circumstance, an error message must be displayed to inform the user that the input they have entered is invalid and allowing them to continue. Much of this code has already been provided for you.

It is our recommendation that you perform "white-box testing" (testing each component of your application, one by one) as you are developing the application. Doing this would maximize the possibility of catching "bugs" before they propagate and impact the next component of your application. Only once you have finished all of the project (and you are confident that each component is behaving correctly) should you attempt any "black-box testing" (testing the overall behaviour of your application). To do so, you must run your application against a carefully designed set of test cases to ensure that it behaves as expected. In generating your set of test data, please make sure that you cover all "boundary test-cases."

When you are sure that your program works perfectly, remove any code that you added for the purpose of debugging your program, before submitting your code. Please note that a very convenient way to debug your code is to temporarily add a new label to your form (e.g., Label1). To examine the contents of a variable that you're using in your program, you can display it on this label (e.g. To see a variable called Count on this label, add the following code to your program: Label1.Caption = Label1.Caption & Count).
 

PROVIDED COMPONENTS

You are provided with about 75% of the program and are required to complete the remaining 25%. The program you are provided with has a modular design. This means that the application is constructed using a set of functions/procedures (each responsible for a different component of the overall application) which get called once the trigger event has occurred. The following is a list of the functionality with which you have been provided:

• User-Friendly interface.
• Modular design.There are many different ways that this program could have been designed and organized, some of them much neater than others.
• Well commented source code. This should make understanding the overall program easier for you.
• The signature of all of the functions which are called. This means that the application is fully designed and just needs to be implemented.
• Driver code. This code will call all of the functions needed to generate an output, based on the user's input.
• Auxillary functions needed to execute some of the primary functions/procedures.
• All of the constants and global variables you need to write this application.

COMPONENTS TO BE COMPLETED

Your assignment consists of the completion of the six number system conversion subroutines, whose signature (first line indicating the name of the subroutine, the parameter(s) it will take and its return value, if any) has already been provided to you.

The following is a list of functions which you  need to complete:

• Bin2Dec:  Binary ==> Decimal. This function takes a positive binary integer, embedded inside of a string, as parameter and will return a string, containing the corresponding decimal number.
• Bin2Oct:   Binary ==> Octal. Similar in architecture to Bin2Dec.
• Dec2Bin:  Decimal ==> Binary. Similar in architecture to Bin2Dec.
• Dec2Oct:  Decimal ==> Octal. Similar in architecture to Bin2Dec.
• Oct2Bin:   Octal ==> Binary. Similar in architecture to Bin2Dec.
• Oct2Dec:  Octal ==> Decimal. Similar in architecture to Bin2Dec.

SUBMISSION

The following is a list of things which you need to submit for this assignment:

• A hard copy of your source code only.
• An electronic copy of your project (all files: NumberSystemCoversion.vbp, NumberSystemConversion.vbw and Canvas.frm) on an 3.5 inch floppy disk. Please write your name and student number on the diskette.
• An executable copy of your program (NumberSystemConversion.exe) on the same 3.5 inch floppy disk.
• All of the above should be placed inside of an 8.5x11 inch UNSEALED envelope and given to your TA at the beginning of your tutorial.
• Please make sure that you attach a copy of the provided cover page to the front of the envelope. The information your write on this cover page must be readable and accurate.
• Late assignments will be accepted until 9:00 p.m. on Thursday June 30th. They will receive a penalty of -30%.  They must be left in the CSC104 late drop box (just outside SF2305A).

 

The following is a list of things which you should keep in mind while doing your assignment.

• You are not allowed to use the built-in number conversion functions (i.e., Oct) that are part of the Visual Basic language.
• The work you submit must be 100% yours. You may not discuss or look at anyone else's source code for this assignment. Be aware of rules and regulations concerning plagiarism.
• You are not allowed to modify the existing code in any way.
• You are not allowed to create any additional global variables or constants.
• Make full use of the helper subroutines provided and any built-in VB functions discussed in the course package.
• The most effective way to get this assignment done quickly is to write your code out on paper, and trace it carefully by hand before you ever go near a computer, in order to find, and get rid of, as many errors as possible.
• This assignment should take roughly about 10 hours for an average student. Please allow yourself sufficient time. Keep in mind that there may not be a PC available in the lab at all times (especially near the deadline) as other students will be working on their assignments too.
• Carefully follow the submission instructions, as neglecting them will cost you marks.

© 2000 William Ghorishi