Chapter 2: Integers and Doubles
Numbers are everywhere in programming. A game tracks your score. A banking app calculates interest. A weather service reports temperature. A fitness tracker counts your steps. Behind each of these is a program working with numeric data.
But not all numbers are the same. Some are whole: 42 points, 7 items in your cart, 3 login attempts. Others have decimal parts: 98.6 degrees, $19.99, a 3.75 GPA. This distinction matters because computers store these two kinds of numbers differently, and choosing the wrong one causes problems.
This chapter introduces C#‘s two main numeric types: integers for whole numbers and doubles for decimals. We will start by understanding what these types are and how C# stores them. Then we will learn to compute with them, combine numeric comparisons with control flow, define reusable numeric methods, and group related numeric data into structs.
Chapter Sections
- Data and Memory: How C# represents numbers and how we store them
- Computation: How we transform numeric values through arithmetic and comparison
- Control Flow: How numeric comparisons drive branching, loops, and input validation
- Methods: How we package numeric computations into named, reusable methods
- Custom Types: How we group related numeric data into structs
We begin with Section 1 - Data and Memory: how does C# represent numbers?