Randall C. Waldrep
90847413


Project Outline

"Student Database"

Description:
The primary function of this project will be to allow the user to
add and delete students from the database, search for a student
either by a first/last name or a student number, assign grades,
and request information about entered students. This program
may be of use to a TA, or a grader.

--Included classes--

Class Student:
This class so far contains overloaded constructors for
the name, which accepts both no arguments, (I was thinking about
calling an external function for that), and one that accepts
two char strings of length 20. (for first and last names,
respectively)

There is a class function AddStudent which I'm uncertain shall be
included in the project, as it's function might be replaced by
the constructors.

There is a class function "Assignnumber" which will accept
an object of class Student and return an int, (the assigned student
number).

The class function "Search" currently accepts user-entered first
and last names, and searches an external text file for the data
requested, however I will most likely implement a "linked list" in
its place to accomodate broader searches.

There is another class function "Search" which accepts a student
number instead of a first or last name. This will be replaced by
the above mentioned linked list.

class GraduateStudent:

So far there exists only overloaded constructors for the objects
and inheritance of the base class Student. Because we are not
certain at compile time whether an entered student is a regular
student or a graduate student, I plan on implementing polymorphism
and virtual functions for late binding.

I plan on implementing more classes to accomodate further utility of the
database, however I am not yet certain which I shall include.

--Exceptions--

I will certainly include some exception handlers when implementing
the search utilities. They may be placed to disallow entering nonalphanumeric
characters in a search string, or when attempting to add a student or their associated
student number which already exists in the database.

--Templates--

The use of templates may come in handy when constructing an array of students
as opposed to a linked list. I am not yet certain which method will be employed.