Stage 1 IOS VARIABLES

As you start writing more complex programs you will understand why they are important. With simple programs (such as a program that simply prints out a value) variables really dont come into play/have advantages. but with programs that actually do stuff, perform operations, use functions/methods, etc variables are a necessity. most programming would not be possible without them.

you are correct that an advantage of variables is being able to reference them whenever you want how every many times you want

one of the biggest advantages of variables is that they allow you to associate a name with a value. they make your code much easier to read and understand.

hard coding values is referred to as using "magic numbers". you have no idea what they are for. they are just there.

also variables can change (hence the name). lets say I had a variable called temperature. I could raise the temperature by increasing the variable by 1.

int increaseTemp(int temperature) {

 return temperature + 1;

}

//...
int temp = 85;
temp = increaseTemp(temp); // temp is now 86
temp = increaseTemp(temp); //temp is now 87

// ... further down in code

temp = increaseTemp(temp); temp is no 88

I couldnt do that with a magic number. I would have to do it manually each time and I would have to go back and check what the value was before I increased it every single time.

int temp = 85;
temp = 86;

it would be too hard to manage that for all your different values you wanted to keep track of.