A contact book

The problem

Build a program that adds, searches, deletes and lists contacts from typed commands, and saves them to a file between runs.

Requirements

• Each contact is a struct or class with a name, a phone number and an email address
• Contacts are kept in a map from name to contact, so that listing is alphabetical
• Commands include add, find, delete, list, save and quit
• Saving and loading use file streams, and a missing file is handled calmly
• Errors in commands give a clear message and do not stop the program
• The program uses no raw new or delete

Technologies

• C++
• map and string
• File streams
• Exceptions

Step by step

1. Define the Contact type, and write a function that prints one.
2. Write functions for adding, finding and deleting, each taking the map by reference.
3. Write the list function, taking the map by const reference.
4. Write save and load, using one line per contact.
5. Write the command loop, reading a line and splitting it with a string stream.
6. Add checks for missing arguments and unknown names.
7. Restart the program and confirm that the contacts came back.
8. Compile with -Wall -Wextra, and fix every warning.

Expected result

A working command-line address book whose data survives between runs.

How it is evaluated

• Contacts survive a restart
• Bad commands never crash the program
• Large values are passed by const reference
• The code compiles with no warnings

Ways to improve it

• Search by part of a name
• Export the contacts as CSV
• Keep several phone numbers for each contact