Requesting help for programming/ CS majors?

[Kibblre]

By the way, do you HAVE to use arrays or can you use vectors? I personally prefer vectors.

EDIT: I totally missed this part: Ask the user to entire his/her name one letter at a time.

[Superfreak04]

We have to use arrays.

[rushyrulz]

you might need to use another include statement to make the .length operator (or C++ equivalent) work, I know C style languages are kinda bitches when it comes to that. Just google syntactical crap that is confusing you.

[Kibblre]

In case you hadn't been able to translate rushy's code, here's what part one could look like:

#include <iostream>
using namespace std;

int main()
{
	char name[50];
	int count = 0;
	bool valid = true;
	char inputChar; 

	cout << "Enter a name one letter at a time and denote the end of the name with *: ";

	while(valid)
	{
		cin >> inputChar;
		if(inputChar != '*')
		{
			name[count] = inputChar;
			count++;
		}
		else
			valid = false;
	}

	system("pause");
	return 0;
}

Originally Posted by rushyrulz

you might need to use another include statement to make the .length operator (or C++ equivalent) work, I know C style languages are kinda bitches when it comes to that. Just google syntactical crap that is confusing you.

Finding the size of a char array in C++ is sizeof(name).

Also, you might want to look into including the * as well for your later parts so you know to stop sorting there. Or make a new array using the count variable, but you'd have to make the new char array a pointer since you can't declare variable size char arrays unless you do.

[rushyrulz]

damn, C++ is so much nicer at handling IO than other languages I've programmed in..
Do you know if there's any way to restrict input to just one character, Kibblre?

[shenjoku]

lol bubble sort.

*ahem*

If you want to let STL do the sorting for you it's very simple. Just call std::sort() like this:

std::sort(name, name + sizeof name);

The sizeof name part only works if you're using an array like you currently are. If you ever want to change to dynamically allocate the array so you aren't limited to some hard-coded number of characters then you would replace that part with whatever the calculated size of the array is (which I guess you'd do based on the user input). Or you could just replace it with 12 or whatever other hard-coded size you change to. Up to you

You might want to consider looking up how std::sort() works and try to implement it yourself. It's always good to know how the internal stuff works.

It's a shame you're limited to using an array. If you could use std::string you could just do a single

std::string name; std::cin >> name;

to get the entire name. Oh well. Gotta learn how to use arrays at some point I suppose

[rushyrulz]

would you prefer a merge sort instead? it's nlog(n) instead of n²

[Kibblre]

Originally Posted by rushyrulz

damn, C++ is so much nicer at handling IO than other languages I've programmed in..
Do you know if there's any way to restrict input to just one character, Kibblre?

I used Java more than C++, so I don't know if there's a direct IO function to handle it. You could use getline() to take in the whole line and then use substr() to cut it down to the first character only and finally cast it as a char.

[rushyrulz]

yikes. I'd hate to have the program explode because someone was typing too fast and accidentally entered a two character input.
t
h
i
s
i
s
s
o
s
t
u
p
i
d
w
h
y
a
m
i
d
o
i
n
g
t
hi *EXPLOSION*
s

[Kibblre]

It wouldn't explode. It would actually read it/print it later as hi.

Enter a name one letter at a time and denote the end of the name with *: he
l
l
o
*
(print loop went here, printing 1 char at a time)
he
l
l
o
Press any key to continue . . .

EDIT: Actually, it indexes it correctly. h is index 0 and e is index 1. Really odd why it prints like that then.

[Superfreak04]

Originally Posted by Kibblre

In case you hadn't been able to translate rushy's code, here's what part one could look like:

#include <iostream>
using namespace std;

int main()
{
	char name[50];
	int count = 0;
	bool valid = true;
	char inputChar; 

	cout << "Enter a name one letter at a time and denote the end of the name with *: ";

	while(valid)
	{
		cin >> inputChar;
		if(inputChar != '*')
		{
			name[count] = inputChar;
			count++;
		}
		else
			valid = false;
	}

	system("pause");
	return 0;
}

Finding the size of a char array in C++ is sizeof(name).

Also, you might want to look into including the * as well for your later parts so you know to stop sorting there. Or make a new array using the count variable, but you'd have to make the new char array a pointer since you can't declare variable size char arrays unless you do.

Hmm, I used this code and what happens is that I can type and hit as many letters as I want. Then once I type in, then it will end. Makes sense, although I'm supposed to make it ask me to enter a character each time I want to enter a new one.

"Enter a name one letter at a time and denote the end of the name with *: E

"Enter a name one letter at a time and denote the end of the name with *: R

"Enter a name one letter at a time and denote the end of the name with *: I

"Enter a name one letter at a time and denote the end of the name with *: C

etc.

At least, that's how we've been taught. It's so that we can make sure it's working properly I guess.

[shenjoku]

Originally Posted by rushyrulz

damn, C++ is so much nicer at handling IO than other languages I've programmed in..
Do you know if there's any way to restrict input to just one character, Kibblre?

You can. You call std::cin() with std::setw(), passing it the number of characters you're expecting like this:

#include <iomanip> // Need this for std::setw()

char c;
std::cin >> std::setw(1) >> c;

This will only read in the first character input by the user. This will not limit them on what they can input though.

[Kibblre]

Originally Posted by Superfreak04

Hmm, I used this code and what happens is that I can type and hit as many letters as I want. Then once I type in, then it will end. Makes sense, although I'm supposed to make it ask me to enter a character each time I want to enter a new one.

"Enter a name one letter at a time and denote the end of the name with *: E

"Enter a name one letter at a time and denote the end of the name with *: R

"Enter a name one letter at a time and denote the end of the name with *: I

"Enter a name one letter at a time and denote the end of the name with *: C

etc.

At least, that's how we've been taught. It's so that we can make sure it's working properly I guess.

Then you'd just have to move the cout statement from where it is to directly above the cin statement. That way it'll print out every time the loop restarts. So the while loop would look like:

	while(valid)
	{
                cout << "Enter a name one letter at a time and denote the end of the name with *: ";
		cin.get(inputChar);
		if(inputChar != '*')
		{
			name[count] = inputChar;
			count++;
		}
		else
			valid = false;
           
                cout << endl; //put and end line here for better readability
	}

Originally Posted by shenjoku

You can. You call std::cin() with std::setw(), passing it the number of characters you're expecting like this:

#include <iomanip> // Need this for std::setw()

char c;
std::cin >> std::setw(1) >> c;

This will only read in the first character input by the user. This will not limit them on what they can input though.

Yup, now I remember. I haven't used setw since last year and I totally forgot about it.

[dAnceguy117]

here's a sketchy solution for step 3 using C-style everything (which seems to work? based on the sample code?) and keeping rushy's variable names.

no guarantees about just plugging this in, but you should be able to see what your objective is here.

char letter_a = 'a';
int value_a = (int)letter_a;

int distribution[26];

for (int i=0; i<26; i++)
{
	distribution[i] = 0;
}

for (int i=0; i<name.size(); i++)
{
	int value_myLetter = (int)name[i];
	int elemNumber = value_myLetter - value_a;
	
	distribution[elemNumber]++;
}

and then uhhh you're gonna want to print it.

[Kibblre]

Originally Posted by Superfreak04

I have to use dummy's because the PC won't display anything without it.

Not sure if you caught this yet looking at my code, but that's what system("pause") will do for you.

Also, what level course is this? If this is an introductory course then he's making you do some tricky stuff for that level.

[Superfreak04]

Originally Posted by Kibblre

Not sure if you caught this yet looking at my code, but that's what system("pause") will do for you.

Also, what level course is this? If this is an introductory course then he's making you do some tricky stuff for that level.

Yeah I noticed that right away lol. And yes this is intro. ;_;

[Kibblre]

Question about part 2: does he want capitals included too? It'll make it even harder if you have to sort lower case letters combined with capital letters instead of making them all lowercase. If you were to use standard sorting methods, the capitals would sort themselves to the beginning in order then the lower case letters would be in order, like ABCDabcd

[Superfreak04]

I believe she wants us to include capitals. Even though it's up to the user whether or not you wanna type in a capital.

[Kibblre]

Originally Posted by Superfreak04

I believe she wants us to include capitals. Even though it's up to the user whether or not you wanna type in a capital.

So then you'd want the output like I described? It'll be tough to make it aAbBcCdD

[Air En Trance]

this assignment is a horrible way to learn arrays and input