The ? Operator Conditional or ternary operator

C/C++ contains a very powerful and convenient operator that replaces certain
statements of the if-then-else form. The ternary operator ? takes the general form
Exp1 ? Exp2 : Exp3;
where Exp1, Exp2, and Exp3 are expressions. Notice the use and placement of the colon.
The ? operator works like this: Exp1 is evaluated. If it is true, Exp2 is evaluated
and becomes the value of the expression. If Exp1 is false, Exp3 is evaluated and its
value becomes the value of the expression. For example, in
x = 10;
y = x>9 ? 100 : 200;
y is assigned the value 100. If x had been less than 9, y would have received the value
200. The same code written using the if-else statement is
x = 10;
if(x>9) y = 100;
else y = 200;
The ? operator will be discussed more fully in Chapter 3 in relationship to the other
conditional statements.