I have in my notes that strcmp will compare 2 strings with each other. But how does it do this? I mean would it say that abc and cba are the same, or are they different things? I.e. does it just compare the letters in the string, or does the order matter?
The order matters. Two strings are equal if and only if they have the same characters in the same order.
just characters one by one
Something like this: (of course it is more optimised)
Code:int strcmp(char* a, char* b) { while(*a != '\0' && *b != '\0' ) { if(*a != *b) return *b - *a; a++; b++; } return *b - *a; }
All problems in computer science can be solved by another level of indirection,
except for the problem of too many layers of indirection.
– David J. Wheeler
From http://src.opensolaris.org/source/xr...9/gen/strcmp.s (which is from http://www.google.ca/search?hl=en&q=...entation&meta=):
[edit] Personally, I think [-1] looks weird.Code:32 /* strcmp(s1, s2) 33 * 34 * Compare strings: s1>s2: >0 s1==s2: 0 s1<s2: <0 35 * 36 * Fast assembler language version of the following C-program for strcmp 37 * which represents the `standard' for the C-library. 38 * 39 * int 40 * strcmp(s1, s2) 41 * register const char *s1; 42 * register const char *s2; 43 * { 44 * 45 * if(s1 == s2) 46 * return(0); 47 * while(*s1 == *s2++) 48 * if(*s1++ == '\0') 49 * return(0); 50 * return(*s1 - s2[-1]); 51 * } 52 */[/edit]
Last edited by dwks; 12-13-2006 at 01:32 PM.
dwk
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http://www.cplusplus.com/ref/cstring/strcmp.html
strcmp() can tell you if the two strings are equal to each other and if not, it will tell you which one is comes first in "ASCIIbetic" order, which is a very cheap way of sorting done as simple as a > operation between two characters in the string, or substraction as illustrated above.Return Value.
Returns a value indicating the lexicographical relation between the strings:
return value description
<0 string1 is less than string2
0 string1 is the same as string2
>0 string1 is greater than string2
This is ugly most of the time since 'A' and 'a' are different characters. You'd probably want stricmp() for better sorting, unfortunately I don't think that stricmp() is a part of the standard.
It isn't part of the ANSI standard, although I think it may be part of the POSIX standard.unfortunately I don't think that stricmp() is a part of the standard.
dwk
Seek and ye shall find. quaere et invenies.
"Simplicity does not precede complexity, but follows it." -- Alan Perlis
"Testing can only prove the presence of bugs, not their absence." -- Edsger Dijkstra
"The only real mistake is the one from which we learn nothing." -- John Powell
Other boards: DaniWeb, TPS
Unofficial Wiki FAQ: cpwiki.sf.net
My website: http://dwks.theprogrammingsite.com/
Projects: codeform, xuni, atlantis, nort, etc.
