How do I prevent a runaway input loop when I request a number but the user enters a non-number?

Question

I need to know how to make my cin statement not appear to \'remove\' itself if you input the wrong type. The code is here:

int mathOperator()
{
  using names         


        

Answer 1

You must check that input succeeded and handle when it doesn't:

int mathOperator() {
  using namespace std;

  int Input;
  do {
    cout << "Choose: ";
    el();
    cout << "1) Addition";
    el();
    cout << "2) Subtraction";
    el();
    cout << "3) Multiplication";
    el();
    cout << "4) Division";
    el();
    el();
    while (!(cin >> Input)) {  // failed to extract
      if (cin.eof()) {  // testing eof() *after* failure detected
        throw std::runtime_error("unexpected EOF on stdin");
      }
      cin.clear();  // clear stream state
      cin.ignore(INT_MAX, '\n');  // ignore rest of line
      cout << "Input error.  Try again!\n";
    }
  } while (Input != 1 && Input != 2 && Input!=3 && Input!=4);
  return Input;
}

If you don't check that extraction succeeded, then cin is left in a failed state (cin.fail()). Once in a failed state, later extractions will immediately return instead of trying to read from the stream, effectively making them no-ops – leading to your infinite loop.