power of an integer in c++ [duplicate]

Answer 1

I assume your homework assignment is to write an integral exponent function. First, take a look at what an exponent is:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exponent

Then, look in your textbook for how to multiply numbers in C. You'll want to use a for loop.

Answer 2

Why linearly? Try it logarithmic!!

long long powx( int val, int exp )
{
    long long actual = val;
    long long prod = 1;
    int i;

    for ( i = 0; i < 32; i++ )
    { 
        if ( exp & 0x1 )
        {
            prod *= actual;
        }

        exp >>= 1;

        actual *= actual;
    }

    return prod;
}

Answer 3

Binary powering, aka exponentiation by squaring.

int powi (int base, unsigned int exp)
{
    int res = 1;
    while (exp) {
        if (exp & 1)
            res *= base;
        exp >>= 1;
        base *= base;
    }
    return res;
}

Note that this returns 1 for powi(0,0).

Answer 4

C++ standard doesn't have int pow(int, int) (It has double pow(double, int), float ...). Microsoft's cmath uses C math.h that has not ipow. Some cmath headers define template version of pow.

$ cat main.cpp
#include <cmath>

int main() {
  std::pow(2,2);
}

$ gcc main.cpp # this cmath has template pow
...snip... std::pow<int, int>(int, int)]+0x16): undefined reference to `pow'
collect2: ld returned 1 exit status
1 ;( user@host:
$ gcc main.cpp -lm

Search for function:ipow lang:c++ on Google Code .

Here's example from the first link:

template <typename Type1, typename Type2>
Type1 ipow(Type1 a, Type2 ex)
// Return a**ex
{
    if ( 0==ex )  return 1;
    else
    {
        Type1 z = a;
        Type1 y = 1;
        while ( 1 )
        {
            if ( ex & 1 )  y *= z;
            ex /= 2;
            if ( 0==ex )  break;
            z *= z;
        }
        return y;
    }
}

See calculating integer powers (squares, cubes, etc.) in C++ code.

Answer 5

Wouldn't a tail-recursive function be best? Something like:

int myPow_helper(int x, int p, int result) {
   if (p == 0) {
      return result;
   } else {
      return myPow_helper(x, p-1, result*x);
   }
}

int myPow(int x, int p) {
   return myPow_helper(x, p, 1);
}

Answer 6

A better recursive approach than Zed's.

int myPow(int x, int p)
{
  if (p == 0) return 1;
  if (p == 1) return x;

  int tmp = myPow(x, p/2);
  if (p%2 == 0) return tmp * tmp;
  else return x * tmp * tmp;
}

Much better complexity there O(log²(p)) instead of O(p).