Java for Beginners: Building a Power Calculator

Learn to create a function for calculating electrical power

Photo by Thomas Kelley on Unsplash

Step 1: Understanding the Problem

Before diving into the code, let’s first understand the problem. We need to create a function that takes two inputs, voltage and current, and returns the calculated power. The power can be calculated using the formula:

Power = Voltage × Current

Here are some examples to illustrate the desired behavior:

• power(230, 10) ➞ 2300
• power(110, 3) ➞ 330
• power(480, 20) ➞ 9600

Step 2: Creating the Function

Now that we understand the problem, let’s start by creating a function in Java. We’ll name our function power and declare it with the following syntax:

public static int power(int voltage, int current) {
    // Function body goes here
}

This function takes two integers as arguments (voltage and current) and returns an integer. The public keyword means that the function can be accessed from anywhere in our code, while static means that we don’t need to create an object of the class to use this function.

Step 3: Calculating…