I need to produce output like this. in first line there should be 1 esoteric (*), in 2nd line 3 esoteric (***), in 3rd line 5 esoteric (*****), in 4th line 7 esoteric (*******), and then decreasing to 5, 3 and 1 esoteric in c++.

i think you need output like this.

*

***

*****

*******

*****

***

*

here is its c++ code.

#include <iostream>

using namespace std;

void main()

{

int row,star,star2;

for(row=1;row<=7;row++)

{

    if(row<=4)

                {             

                for(star=1;star<=2*row-1;star++)

                   {

                      cout<<"*";

                   }

                }

   if(row>=5)

                {

           for(star2=1;star2<=15-2*row;star2++)

                 {

                   cout<<"*";

                  }

               }

 cout<<endl;

}

}

it is just easy to understand , i hope you will learn it.