spaces in text input causing problems

[Unleashed]

I am taking my first C++ class, so I'm sure there are better ways for doing what I am attempting to do. I am trying to populate a vector<string> with input from a user. Everything works great as long as the input is 1 word. If the input contains a space then the program goes weird on me. Nonetheless, here is what I have done. I declared the follow (at the beginning of program):

vector<string> favList;
string gameName;
enum options {CREATE = 1, ADD, REMOVE, CLEAR, DISPLAY, QUIT};
int choice;

I then asked the user to enter a number from a menu and then used a switch. So far, it is the following case that doesn't work (hope there are no more).


case CREATE:
{
char again;
do
{
cout << "\nPlease enter a game title for your list: ";
cin >> gameName;
favList.push_back(gameName);
cout << "\nWould you like to enter another game title(y/n)? ";
cin >> again;
} while (again == 'y');
break;
}

My textbook only shows examples of single words being used. How do I allow the use to enter a gameName that is more than one word?

Thanks in advance for any help I get

[Duthomhas]

Something that C++ teachers and textbooks almost invariably fail to teach at the outset is that >> is for formatted input. People use it all the time for general input but that is often a bad idea (at least until you know what you are doing).

To get unformatted string input from the user, up-to his pressing the Enter key, use the <string> getline() function:

#include <cctype>
#include <iostream>
#include <limits>
#include <string>
using namespace std;

...

    string gameName;
    char again;
    do
    {
        cout << "\nPlease enter a game title for your list: ";
        getline( cin, gameName );
        favList.push_back( gameName );
        cout << "\nWould you like to enter another game title(y/n)? ";
        cin >> again;
        cin.ignore( numeric_limits <streamsize> ::max(), '\n' );
    } while (toupper( again ) == 'Y');

This demonstrates two things: getting an unformatted string (automatically reads the '\n' and discards it), and getting a formatted input (a char). The character input is immediately followed by cin.ignore() in order to read everything up-to and including the '\n' and discard it.

This makes sure your input stream is ready for the next input, whether it be an unformatted string input or a formatted char/int/whatever input. In this example, it also allows the user to enter things like "yes" without choking. If you only want a single character before the user hits Enter, you could just say:
cin >> ws;
to read (and discard) all whitespace (including that unread '\n' sitting in the input buffer).

Hope this helps.

[Unleashed]

Thank you so much for your help...it was all helpful!!!

And I just figured out how to place the code in the forum, will have to use it next time...as I am sure there will be.

Again, thanks for the help and understanding of textbook/teacher issue as well.