Question about reading in data from a file and using getline function

[james116]

Hi everyone. I am relatively new to C++ and I am trying to create a program that reads data about different songs in from a file and displays the total length of all the songs and the average rating of all of them. Here is an example of the data that I would be reading in:

Just Give Me A Reason|P!nk Featuring Nate Ruess|4:22|4.0
When I Was Your Man|Bruno Mars|3:33|3.5
Thrift Shop|Macklemore & Ryan Lewis Featuring Wanz|3:55|4.5

I think my program is close to being done but for some reason it is not returning the correct length and average rating of all of the songs.

I would really appreciate it if someone could take a look at my code and help me to understand what I am doing wrong.

Thanks!

#include <iostream>
#include <string>
#include <fstream>
#include <cstdlib>
using namespace std;

// Structure declaration
struct Song
{
    string title;
    string artist;
    int minutes;
    int seconds;
    double rating;
};

// Function prototype
Song getInfo(ifstream &);

int main()
{
    Song song;
    int index = 0, seconds = 0, totalSeconds = 0, minutes = 0, totalMinutes = 0;
    double totalRating = 0.0, avgRating = 0.0;
    ifstream dataFile;
    ofstream outputFile;
    string filename;

    // Get the file name from the user
    cout << "Enter the name of a file containing songs." << endl;
    cin >> filename;

    // Open the file
    dataFile.open(filename.c_str());

    // Test if file opens
    while (!(dataFile))
    {
        cout << "The file you entered does not exist." << endl;
        cout << "Please enter a valid file name: ";
        cin >> filename;
        dataFile.open(filename.c_str());
    }

    // Get info about songs from file
    while (dataFile)
    {

        song = getInfo(dataFile);
        cout << song.title << song.artist << endl;
        cout << song.minutes << ":" << song.seconds << endl;
        cout << song.rating << endl;

        // Totals numbers
        totalMinutes += song.minutes;
        totalSeconds += song.seconds;
        totalRating += song.rating;

        index++;
    }


    // Puts the total minutes and seconds into one nice format
    seconds = totalSeconds % 60;
    totalSeconds -= seconds;

    minutes = totalSeconds / 60;
    totalMinutes += minutes;

    // Calculates average rating
    avgRating = totalRating / index;

    cout << "Minutes: " << totalMinutes << endl;
    cout << "seconds: " << totalSeconds << endl;
    cout << "average rating: " << avgRating << endl;
    cout << "index: " << index << endl;

    // Open file for output
    outputFile.open("output.txt");



    // Print summary findings to output file
    if (totalSeconds < 10)
    {
        cout << "\n\nThe total length of the song titles in the input file is: "
            << totalMinutes << ":0" << totalSeconds << endl;
    }
    else
    {
        cout << "\n\nThe total length of the song titles in the input file is: "
            << totalMinutes << ":" << totalSeconds << endl;
    }

    cout << "The average rating of the song titles in the input file is: "
        << song.rating << "." << endl;

    // Close the files
    dataFile.close();
    outputFile.close();

    return 0;
}

    // Function that populates Song structure with information
    Song getInfo(ifstream &inFile)
    {
        Song tempSong;              // Temporary structure variable
        string title, artist, rating;

        // Populates structure with song information

            // Read in song title
            getline(inFile, title, '|');
            tempSong.title = title;

            // Read in Artist name
            getline(inFile, artist, '|');
            tempSong.artist = artist;

            // Read in the minutes
            inFile >> tempSong.minutes;

            inFile.get();

            // Read in seconds
            inFile >> tempSong.seconds;

            inFile.get();

            // Read in the rating of the song
            inFile >> tempSong.rating;

        return tempSong;
    }

[coder777]

The problem is that the operator>> expects a space as delimiter not a ':'

inFile >> tempSong.minutes;
will fail. You need to read minutes/seconds as string and convert it (using stringstream) after that