Is there a faster way to work out this logic?

Question

The purpose of this assignment was the find the smallest and largest of the integer(User inputs 5 entries)

I am a beginner Java programmer with no prior experience. Is there an easier way to do this without a ton of if/else statements?

Forgive for the dirty code.

    //Scanner Object
    Scanner input = new Scanner(System.in);

    int num1, num2, num3, num4, num5;
    int large;
    int small;

    System.out.print("Enter Num1: ");
    num1 = input.nextInt();

    System.out.print("Enter Num2: ");
    num2 = input.nextInt();

    System.out.print("Enter Num3: ");
    num3 = input.nextInt();

    System.out.print("Enter Num4: ");
    num4 = input.nextInt();

    System.out.print("Enter Num5: ");
    num5 = input.nextInt();

    //If/Else statements (SMALL)
    if (num1<num2 && num1<num3 && num1<num4 && num1<num5) {
        small = num1;

        }


    else if (num2<num1 && num2<num3 && num2<num4 && num2<num5) {
                small = num2;

                        }

    else if (num3<num1 && num3<num2 && num3<num4 && num3<num5) {
                small = num3;


    }

    else if (num4<num1 && num4<num2 && num4<num3 && num4<num5) {
                small = num4;


    }

    else {
        small = num5;

    }

    //Large

    if (num1>num2 && num1>num3 && num1>num4 && num1>num5) {
        large = num1;
    }

    else if (num2>num1 && num2>num3 && num2>num4 && num2>num5) {
                                        large = num2;
    }

    else if (num3>num1 && num3>num2 && num3>num4 && num3>num5) {
                large = num3;
    }

    else if (num4>num1 && num4>num2 && num4>num3 && num4>num5) {
                    large = num4;
    }

    else {
                large = num5;

            }


    //Display: Use printf when using a format limiter (%)

    System.out.printf("The smallest integer: %d\n", small);
    System.out.printf("The largest integer: %d\n", large);




    }// end of main

}

Answer 1

You can use not only arrays like Caleb suggested, but also lists and sorting.

It is not the most efficient way, but it is, in my opinion, the fastest one to implement.

public static void main(String[] args) {
    Scanner input = new Scanner(System.in);
    List numbers = new ArrayList<Integer>();

    int currentNumber;

    for(int i=0; i<5; i++){
        System.out.print("Enter Num"+(i+1)+": ");
        currentNumber=input.nextInt();
        numbers.add(currentNumber);
    }

    Collections.sort(numbers);

    System.out.printf("The smallest integer: %d\n", numbers.get(0));
    System.out.printf("The largest integer: %d\n", numbers.get(4));

}// end of main

Edit:

An alternative for millions of elements, improved with jk.'s proposal:

public static void main(String[] args) {
    Scanner input = new Scanner(System.in);

    Integer min = Integer.MAX_VALUE;
    Integer max = Integer.MIN_VALUE;

    int currentNumber;

    for(int i=0; i<5; i++){
        System.out.print("Enter Num"+(i+1)+": ");
        currentNumber=input.nextInt();

        max = Math.max(max, currentNumber);
        min = Math.min(min, currentNumber);
    }


    System.out.printf("The smallest integer: %d\n", min);
    System.out.printf("The largest integer: %d\n", max);

}// end of main

Answer 2

There are definitely better ways to do that. Put the values in an array and then scan through the array looking keeping track of the smallest and largest values you find:

for (i in valueArray) {
    if (i < min) 
        min = i;
    if (i > max)
        max = i;
}

I'll leave that into real code up to you.

Answer 3

Others have provided good, generalized solutions. I would offer a variant of this which avoids sorting:

int largest = Integer.MIN_VALUE;
System.out.print("Enter Num1: ");
num1 = input.nextInt();
largest = Math.max(num1, largest)

System.out.print("Enter Num2: ");
num2 = input.nextInt();
largest = Math.max(num2, largest)

System.out.print("Enter Num3: ");
num3 = input.nextInt();
largest = Math.max(num3, largest)

System.out.print("Enter Num4: ");
num4 = input.nextInt();
largest = Math.max(num4, largest)

System.out.print("Enter Num5: ");
num5 = input.nextInt();
largest = Math.max(num5, largest)

This is basically the same as Caleb's suggestion, but without the enumeration and done along the way.