Calorie Management Over the course of this class and the few weeks that encompassed this learning process, we have learned several different conceptual applications for the integration of algorithms within the infrastructure of a company. The idea of using an algorithm or a program to influence or benefit our daily lives is an obvious choice for an application. We cannot use a program to cure cancer, diabetes or other wide ranging diseases, but we can use it to help with weight management, the mastery of which can lead to several different areas of improvement. By creating a program that will aid in the eradication of obesity, we can go a long way towards improving the mass health of the worldwide human population. The obesity rate in America has become an epidemic. According to Forecasting Obesity in America, obesity rates in America could be up as high as 86.3 percent by 2030 and in 40 years every single American could be overweight (Bialik, 2008). Those numbers may be a bit outlandish, but they are not far off given the current state of our nation. With that said, weight management boils down to a simple question of "Are we taking in fewer calories than we are burning?" and “Are we truly taking action to manage our weight?” We need to figure out a way to let individuals see the true results of their daily calorie intake and help he or she see exactly what affect it is having on their overall health. By helping individuals see those results we can hopefully help to reduce the number of obese people in this country and improve the overall health of America. A place to start accomplishing this goal is to create a program to show individuals what they are doing to their body and help improve calorie control. To determine an accurate answer using our program, we must decide what data we must output for the user. We must also decide what data and what processes we need to run in order to produce said output. Here we will discuss those issues and how they apply directly to the algorithm we have created. Problem Statement A team of software developers has been awarded a contract to develop a program to determine if a person is balancing calorie intake. The challenge to the developers is to determine what tasks need to be completed so that the end result shows the person an accurate result as to whether or not they are losing or gaining weight. To determine these tasks the developers need to write a top notch algorithm in pseudo code that helps to lay out what needs to be accomplished. Once the tasks are identified the program can be written.
Program Solution The solution the developers came up with is to create a calorie calculator. The calorie calculator will ask for inputs from the person and those inputs will be processed by the program to show the person what their basal metabolic rate is and whether they are gaining or losing weight. The results will allow the person to evaluate their diet and decide whether or not what they are doing is helping or hampering their health.
Inputs and Outputs The input of the program is the variables that are inputted to produce a result. When the inputs are entered into the program the program takes the information and makes calculations based on the information it is given. The program then performs an output that shows the results of the calculations that were performed. The calorie calculator will take the variables that are inputted by an individual and then show them whether or not they are losing or gaining weight. There are many variables to take into account to produce the desired results. To make an accurate calculation the first thing the program needs to know is the person’s gender. The gender input will tell the program which formula to use to calculate a person’s basal metabolic rate, or BMR. BMR is the rate at which a person burns calories while resting. Antoine Lavoisier regarded as the founder of modern chemistry was able to show that respiration is the combination of oxygen in the air with carbon and hydrogen admitted from the body. Taking these findings in count he was able to measure an animal’s metabolic rate in a resting state, which was probably the first measure of BMR (Hulbert & Else, 2004). Determining this value is a key component to the final calculation. There are three other inputs that need to be entered to calculate the individual’s BMR. The values for the calculation are their age, height, and weight. The program will input these values into the formula to produce the final calculation. As explained on calories per hour’s website here is the formula for calculating BMR for males and females ("Calories Per Hour", n.d.).
Male
BMR = 66 + (13.7 * weight in kilograms) + (5 * height in centimeters) - (6.8 * age in years)
Female
BMR = 655 + (9.6 * weight in kilograms) + (1.8 * height in centimeters) - (4.7 * age in years) The formula to calculate BMR needs to convert a person’s weight into kilograms and their height into centimeters. Most people calculate their height in feet and their weight in pounds. The developers created tasks that do the conversion for the person inputting the information. Once the conversions are completed the values are inputted into the BMR formula, the program makes the calculation, and the program will output a value that is shown to the person. The next task the program needs to complete is to calculate the person’s calorie intake. The program will need to have the person input the calories they consumed breakfast, lunch, and dinner. This means that the calories inputted question needs to be repeated by the program three times to get the values for calories consumed. This will be performed by an array and once the values are inputted the array will add the values together. The program will then ask for the calories the person burned by exercise. This formula can be quite complex because there are different calculations to complete the final result. To get around this the developers asked for an estimated value from the individual or they can use an online calculator that calculates the amount of calories burned while exercising. The final formula will take the values of the amount of calories consumed, subtract that from the BMR plus the amount of calories burned by exercise and divide it by 3500. 3500 is the amount of calories that is burned to lose one pound. Here is the formula that performs the final calculation. Final Calculation Total = (Calories consumed – (BMR + Calories burned by exercise))/3500 When the final calculation is made there is an If Then statement that looks at the value and if the total is less than zero it will output a statement that tells the person that they lost weight. Any value greater that zero produces an output statement that tells the person that they gained weight. The next section lays out the pseudo code the developers came up with to lay the ground work for the program creation.
Pseudo Code
BEGIN

WEIGHT = LBS * .454
HEIGHT = FEET*12*2.54
SET BMR as Float
SET GENDER as char
SET YEARS as Int
SET LBS as Float
SET FEET as Float
SET SUM as Int
SET EXERCISE as Int
SET TOTAL as Float
SET CONSUMED as Int

DISPLAY “Welcome to Team B’s Calorie Management Calculator.”

DISPLAY “This calculator is used to measure whether or not your calorie intake is “

DISPLAY “balanced with calories expended and shows if you are losing or gaining weight.”

DISPLAY “First we need to calculate your BMR.”

DISPLAY “Your BMR is the number of calories you burn while resting.”

DISPLAY “Be sure to include the quotation marks.”

DISPLAY “Are you Male of Female? Type “M” for Male, and “F” for Female: “
INPUT GENDER

DISPLAY “How old are you in years?”
INPUT YEARS

DISPLAY “How much do you weigh in pounds?”
INPUT LBS

DISPLAY “How tall are you in feet?”
INPUT FEET

IF GENDER = “M” BMR = 66 + (13.7 * WEIGHT) + (5 * HEIGHT) - (6.8 * YEARS) DISPLAY “Since you are male, your BMR is: “ OUTPUT BMR
ELSE
BMR = 655 + (9.6 * WEIGHT) + (1.8 * HEIGHT) - (4.7 * YEARS) DISPLAY “Since you are female, your BMR is: “ OUTPUT BMR
ENDIF

DISPLAY “Now let’s calculate the weight change:”

MAKE ARRAY (CALORIES,3)

SUM = 0

FOR Count 1 to 3 DISPLAY “How many calories did you consume at meal “ & Count “?” INPUT CALORIES(C) SUM = SUM + CALORIES(C)

CONSUMED = SUM

DISPLAY “This is the amount of calories you consumed today: “
OUTPUT CONSUMED

DISPLAY “How many calories did you burn by exercise?"
INPUT EXERCISE

TOTAL = ((BMR + EXERCISE) - CONSUMED)/3500

IF TOTAL < 0 DISPLAY "You lost " OUTPUT & -CONSUMED & DISPLAY "lbs today."
ELSE
DISPLAY “You gained “ OUTPUT & ROUND(CONSUMED) & DISPLAY “lbs today.”
Endif

EXIT

The pseudo-code begins with defining the type of data that each input will be stored as. This also initiates each variable that will be used in the program. The opening displays helps to orient the user with how the program works and what the program does. It gives an overall sense of the process of computing the end result. To make sure that the program is user friendly, and doesn’t present confusing options, we made sure that the program had very specific questions for determining the needed data. Here we come to our first If Then statement. Depending on the user input from the inquiries previously made, the program has two options. The first is if the statement reads True according to user input the user has entered that they are Male, then the first If Then statement will run, if the user does not enter “M”, the program runs the Else statement for Female. After computing the individual’s BMR, the computer then moves on to determine the amount of calories the person has consumed for three meals. This begins by making an array that will hold and add the three numbers inputted by the individual, and will inform the user step by step what to do. We used a For loop to count the three meals, and to keep track and display this information to the user. After the three runs through the loop, all information has been gathered and the program displays the total number of calories consumed. The program continues on by asking the user to input the number of calories they burned that day through exercise. There is no formula for this, so the user will either have to estimate or use another calculator to determine this number. The computer takes this information and processes the final few steps. We come to our last If Then statement where if the user has burned more calories than consumed the first statement is displayed, if the user has consumed more than they expended, then the Else statement runs. This concludes the program.
Conclusion
The rate of obesity in America has risen substantially over the past few decades. The reasons for this are we over eat, we eat too many processed foods and we do not exercise properly. Many of the jobs people do today are sedentary and we exercise our brains more than our bodies. The good thing is many companies have started wellness programs to promote a healthier lifestyle. At Dofasco, Inc. in Hamilton, Ontario in Canada their 1000 employees between 1995 and 2002 have lost 22,000 pounds because of their active lifestyle program. It is these types of programs that are helping all of us maintain a healthy lifestyle. The creation of the calorie management program is another way to promote a healthy lifestyle. It shows the person if their eating and exercise habits helping or hindering their health. This program along with other tools can definitely increase the probability of a healthier world.
Task Documentation

The first part of this project was to understand what was being asked of us, and then to choose which we wanted to do. It was fairly unanimous that we all wanted to work on the Calorie Management option. We then formulated a pseudo code to determine the basic ideas of how we wanted to accomplish the task. A flowchart was made in Visual Logic to continue the development of the program, allowing us to more fully explore the best method for solving the problem. The pseudo-code was updated to reflect the changes made when the flowchart was created, and many hours were put into making the flowchart function as intended. We ran into a problem where it would not calculate one of our assignments properly, causing the program to return the same outcome regardless of the data input. The problem was tracked down to be that the program would not subtract two expressions properly. After a period of time we simply deleted the assignment that was not working and rebuilt it. The cause for the lack of calculation is still unknown. After finishing touches were made to the flowchart, the pseudo-code was checked over to make sure it complied with the flowchart, and the remainder of the paper was written. An outline was made, and each person could choose which section they wanted to complete. After each section is written, that member also puts together the corresponding PowerPoint slides. This concludes the process of completing the assignment.

References Calories Per Hour. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.caloriesperhour.com/tutorial_BMR.php

Hulbert, A.J., & Else, P.L. (2004, 11). Basal Metabolic Rate: History Composition, Regulation and Usefulness. The University of Chicago Press 77(6), 869-876 Bialik, C. (2008, August 16). Forecasting Obesity in America. Virginian - Pilot, p. A.3
Overcoming obesity: a total approach to achieving weight loss. (2002, April). Benefits Canada, 26(4), Insert. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com.ezproxy.apollolibrary.com/docview/224291488?accountid=458