Project 8: C Stacks

The goal of this project is to practice using pointers for programming in C.

1. Introduction

In this project, you will be doing something familiar (implementing stacks two ways: with an array and as a linked list) in a manner unfamiliar (using dynamic arrays and pointers in C). You will be writing two library files (each with both a header and source file) to implement stacks. In either case, you will write a struct that represents the stack itself and a series of functions which provide the behavior of the stack.

2. Setup

Copy the driver program

cp /cslab/class/cs245/cfun/stackdriver.c .

3. Your task

First, open the driver program and look it over. You'll see that it expect the following things:

• Either a header file called arraystack.h or liststack.h. You will write both, and you can test them alternately by commenting out and un-commenting the relevant lines.
• Whichever library is used, it should have a type ArrayStack or ListStack. This will have to be a struct type.
• The library will have to have a makeStack() function which takes an integer indicating a maximum size for the stack and returns a pointer to a newly allocated stack. The list stack can ignore the maximum size (it can grow unbounded).
• The library will have to have the functions push(), pop(), and top, but notice that these take a pointer to the stack as a parameter--- they can't be like instance methods.
• The library will have to have a function destroyStack(), which deallocates the stack.

Then, write the two libraries. Remember what we learned about how to compile and link. Be careful on your use of pointers and your allocating and deallocating.

4. To turn in

Turn in a hard copy of a typescript where you compile and run both versions. For the array version, run your program twice, once where the user enters data until the stack is full, and the other where the user quits by entering -1.

DUE:Wed, Dec 12, 5:00 pm.