Help

**thamiz** · 08-13-2008

i want to make a program in c :
but am a bit stuck, so can you anyone jst guide me through it.
Basically the program has to read in a whole paragraph, and the the program will have to find the words in the paragraph, then it has to sort the words into alphabetically order and and also count the number of times the word appeared in the paragraph and then print, the words in alphabetically order with the frequency.
cheers , if anyone can just guide me through it it would be good. Ps i have developed the sorting algorithm for the program... its an insertion sort.

**noops** · 08-13-2008

What are you stuck on?

**dwks** · 08-13-2008

You probably don't need to read in a whole paragraph. Just read lines.
Then separate the lines into words, with strtok() (ugh) or some function of your own. You may find isspace() or isalpha() from <ctype.h> useful.
Note that you might want to discard non-alphanumeric characters, so that "this." and "this" and "this," are the same word.
Next you have to save each word. If it already exists, increment the counter for it; otherwise, add it in. You could use something like this to store each word:
Code:
```
struct word_t {
    char *word;  /* malloc()'d space for the word */
    int count;  /* number of times the word occurs */
};
```
Or you might want an array if you're not familiar with malloc().
Note that you'll need to use strcmp() to compare the words. If you want case-insensitive comparison (i.e., "a" == "A"), you could use the non-standard strncmp(), but you'd probably be better off writing your own. tolower()/toupper() from <ctype.h> will help you with this.

**thamiz** · 08-14-2008

hi
here is my code for scan function;
how can i make the function store the words, into my program.

Code:

 
#include<stdio.h>
#include<ctype.h>
#define MAXWORDS 20
#define MAXLETTERS 20 
int main(int argc,char *argv[]){
   int character=0;
   int flag=0;
   while(((character=getchar())!=EOF)){
      if (ispunct(character) && flag==0){
         printf("\n");
         flag=1;
      }
      if (isspace(character) && flag==0){
         printf("\n");
         flag=1;
      }
      if (isalpha(character)){
         putchar(character);
         flag=0;
      }
      
   }
   return 0;
}

**dwks** · 08-15-2008

"flag" is a pretty bad variable name in this case. Perhaps "printed_newline" would be better.

How can you store the words instead of printing them? Well, declare an array to store the data in. If you're not feeling up to allocating space and whatnot, then perhaps something like this.

Code:

char word[MAXWORDS][MAXLETTERS];

Then, in order to use your existing code, you'll need a counter for which word you're storing and a counter for which character in that word you're dealing with. (Or just keep the word always NULL-terminated.)

BTW, there are characters that return false for ispunct(), isspace(), and isalpha(). Numbers, for example. I'd use isspace() and !isspace().

**slingerland3g** · 08-15-2008

Lol, I believe this is the notorious exercise #153 in "The C book"

**thamiz** · 08-15-2008

hey guys need some help any one willing 2 help me, here is my separating function, but i can't include a apostrophe in it, any one willing to help me out. cheers.

Code:

int is_separator(char ch) {
  /* Separators are space, comma, colon, semicolon, double quote, question mark, exclamation, and period */
  static char separators[] = { ' ' , ',',':' , '\"', '?' , '!' , '.'};
  int i = 0;

  for(i = 0 ; i<sizeof separators ; i++)
  {
    if(ch == separators[i])
      return TRUE;
  }

  return FALSE;
}

**Kernel Sanders** · 08-15-2008

Why can't you include an apostrophe?

I'd suggest a switch statement rather than a loop

Code:

int is_separator(char ch){
 switch(ch){
  case ' ': case ',': case ':': case '\"': case '?': case '!': case '.': case '\'':
   return 1;
  default:
   return 0;
 }
}

**zacs7** · 08-15-2008

I wouldn't suggest either

Code:

int is_separator(char ch)
{
    static const char seps[] = " ,:\"?!.'";
    return (strchr(seps, ch) != NULL);
}

**Kernel Sanders** · 08-15-2008

Not that it really matters for a small program like this, but a quick benchmark says that strchr is ~50% slower than the switch.

So there

**rasta_freak** · 08-16-2008

So why not table access?

Code:

int is_separator(char ch)
{
  static char T[256] = { -1 };
  if (T[0] == -1)
  {
      memset(T, 0, sizeof(T));
      T[' '] = 1;
      T[','] = 1;
      T[':'] = 1;
      T['?'] = 1;
      T['!'] = 1;
      T['.'] = 1;
      T['\''] = 1;
  }

  return(T[ch]);
}

Just a concept, didn't test...

**thamiz** · 08-17-2008

Originally Posted by thamiz

hi
here is my code for scan function;
how can i make the function store the words, into my program.

Code:

 
#include<stdio.h>
#include<ctype.h>
#define MAXWORDS 20
#define MAXLETTERS 20 
int main(int argc,char *argv[]){
   int character=0;
   int flag=0;
   while(((character=getchar())!=EOF)){
      if (ispunct(character) && flag==0){
         printf("\n");
         flag=1;
      }
      if (isspace(character) && flag==0){
         printf("\n");
         flag=1;
      }
      if (isalpha(character)){
         putchar(character);
         flag=0;
      }
      
   }
   return 0;
}

would i be able to use the code above, to my my is_separator, because i need to separate the words based on the above characters...
if i input any words with punctions the function has to split when there is a puctation marks
for example if i input: the!!! didn't ?
the out put should be: the
didn
t
etc...
any one can help me merge the two function i wrote together

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