Question

I am writing a program for a class assignment on learning about pointers and memory management. Allocating memory for student and courses is necessary with the new operator in this assignment and the program seems to run properly but after it prints everything the program crashes and it says that that it has triggered a break point. Any help would be appreciated.

The error is located here but I’m not sure what it means
/* verify block type */
_ASSERTE(_BLOCK_TYPE_IS_VALID(pHead->nBlockUse));

#include <iostream>
#include <string>
#include <iomanip>
using namespace std;

struct Student //Structs
    {
        string firstName, lastName, aNumber;
        double GPA;
    };
struct Course
    {
        int courseNumber, creditHours;
        string courseName;
        char grade;
    };

Student* readStudent();                                    // Function Prototypes
Course* readCourseArray(int&);
void computeGPA(Student *student, Course *courseArray, int coursesTaken);
void printSummary(Student *studentPTR, Course *courseArray, int courses);
int main()                                                //Main
{
    int courses = 0;
    Student *studentPTR = readStudent();
    Course *coursePTR = readCourseArray(courses);
    computeGPA(studentPTR, coursePTR, courses);
    printSummary(studentPTR, coursePTR, courses);


    delete studentPTR;
    delete coursePTR;
    system ("pause");
    return 0;
}

Student* readStudent()                                       // Read Student
{
    Student* student = new Student;
    cout<<"\nEnter students first name\n";
    cin>>student->firstName;
    cout<<"\nEnter students last name\n";
    cin>>student->lastName;
    cout<<"\nEnter students A-Number\n";
    cin>>student->aNumber;


    return student;
}

Course* readCourseArray(int &courses)                           //Read Courses
{
    cout<<"\nHow many courses is the student taking?\n";
    cin>>courses;
    const int *sizePTR = &courses;
    Course *coursePTR = new Course[*sizePTR]; 

    for(int count = 0; count < *sizePTR; count++)  //Enter course information
    {
        cout<<"\nEnter student "<<count+1<<"'s course name\n";
        cin>>coursePTR[count].courseName;
        cout<<"\nEnter student "<<count+1<<"'s course number\n";
        cin>>coursePTR[count].courseNumber;
        cout<<"\nEnter student "<<count+1<<"'s credit hours\n";
        cin>>coursePTR[count].creditHours;
        cout<<"\nEnter student "<<count+1<<"'s grade\n";
        cin>>coursePTR[count].grade;
    } 


    return coursePTR;
}


void computeGPA(Student *studentPTR, Course *courseArray, int coursesTaken)             // Compute GPA
{
    double total = 0, hours = 0;
    for(int count = 0; count < coursesTaken; count++)
    {
        hours += courseArray[count].creditHours;
        if (courseArray[count].grade == 'A')
            total+=4;
        else if (courseArray[count].grade == 'B')
            total+=3;
        else if (courseArray[count].grade == 'C')
            total+=2;
        else if (courseArray[count].grade == 'D')
            total+=1;
        else if (courseArray[count].grade == 'F')
            total+=0;
    }
    studentPTR->GPA = (total / hours);
}


void printSummary(Student *studentPTR, Course *courseArray, int courses)
{
    cout<<"\nReport\n";
    cout<<"\nNumber   Name                    Hours  Letter Grade  Point Grade";  
    cout<<"\n------   ----                    -----  ------------  -----------\n";
    for(int count = 0; count < courses; count++)
         cout<<setw(3)<<courseArray[count].courseNumber<<"   "<<courseArray[count].courseName<<setw(20)<<"   "<<courseArray[count].creditHours<<setw(5)<<"  "<<courseArray[count].grade<<endl;

    cout<<"\nStudent :"<<studentPTR->firstName<<" "<<studentPTR->lastName;
    cout<<"\nA-Number :"<<studentPTR->aNumber;
    cout<<"\nOverall GPA :"<<studentPTR->GPA;
}

Answer 1

You’re allocating courses with operator new[] (which is for arrays), but freeing it with operator delete, instead of operator delete[].

You should deallocate it like that:

delete[] coursePTR;

I also don’t understand why you use the sizePTR pointer instead of directly using courses.

BTW, just so you’d know, this is not a ‘find my bug’ site. You have a code review site for that.