Type casting comes in handy when we evaluate expressions involving different data type values. Let me explain the whole idea behind type casting -

By default when an arithmetic operator (+, -, *, /, %) is applied on two values of the same data type then this yield the output of same data type.That means int and int operands will yield int result, float and float operands will yield float results and so on.

Implicit type casting
When an arithmetic operator is applied on operands of two different data types, result belongs to the higher data type between the two. Actually data type of the operand with lower data type is promoted to the higher data type. e.g. operation on an int and a float operand will give float result as float data type is bigger.
Explicit type casting
Sometimes both the operands belong to the same data type but we want to have the output with a different data type. Here explicit type casting comes in handy.

e.g.

int a=10,b=7;

float c ;

c=a/b ; // only integer part that is 3 will be produced and assigned to c as a and b both have int data type

but we want to have the output as a float value so that it can be accommodated by float variable c. So following trick that uses explicit type casting will do the job -

c=(float)a/b ; // a being type casted as float

or

c=a/(float)b ; // b being type casted as float

Note: Do write all the programs yourself. Then make changes here and there and re-execute.

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Anand Mahajan

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