A lottery program - arrays, ints, chars etc

Hello,

Im going to create a C++ "database".
It should be 3 dimensional (i.e. A person has some classess, each class requires different books etc.). And the database must sort that info aswell.

For various reasons, I want the user to be able to search the "database" - in a very easy way. Say that, after that the user has stored info about the persons and classes, he will be asked if he wants to search that info, and if yes, he should be able to find the results in such a way, that even if spelled wrong, he would get close results.



This is for educational purposes only. Please keep in mind that I am a starter with C++, and know the basic syntax, so advanced stuff beyond arrays, loops, pointers etc. is not really necessary in the program, please avoid using functions all over the program where it can be avoided, so I understand the principles.

Thank you for reading this.

And your questions is?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Glauber

please avoid using functions all over the program where it can be avoided, so I understand the principles.

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by Elysia

And your questions is?

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Got it now? Its not a question, he is just requesting you not to use functions:D

Yeah, I understand, but I'm not going to write anything.
So I was asking if the OP had a specific question he/she did not understand in developing such a program?

These, "Hey, you do not have anything better to do, write my program for me!", kinds of threads always make me chuckle. What a better way to learn then do nothing and have someone else do all the work.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Elysia

Yeah, I understand, but I'm not going to write anything.
So I was asking if the OP had a specific question he/she did not understand in developing such a program?

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For example. How can you store a char array in an int array? If you want a certain number to be assigned in each loop in a for loop, to a char array?

Example: for(i=0; numberofplayers>i; i++){
cin >> playernames[30];
playernames[30]=playernumber[i];


That dosent work. But I hope you get the idea.

Chars are integers, so you can easily store a character in an integer at will.
What I think you want is the ability to enter and store multiple names for the user.
In such case, std::vector and std::string will be your friends.

Code:

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std::vector<std::string> vPlayers;
vPlayers.reserve(30);
for(i=0; numberofplayers>i; i++){
cin >> playernames[i];
}

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If you need to associate an id with a certain player, use a struct:

Code:

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struct Player
{
    std::string name;
    int nId;
};

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Quote:

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even if spelled wrong, he would get close results

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Levenshtein_distance

I doubt you will be able to do it though if you are just starting out.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Elysia

Chars are integers, so you can easily store a character in an integer at will.
What I think you want is the ability to enter and store multiple names for the user.
In such case, std::vector and std::string will be your friends.

Code:

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std::vector<std::string> vPlayers;
vPlayers.reserve(30);
for(i=0; numberofplayers>i; i++){
cin >> playernames[i];
}

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If you need to associate an id with a certain player, use a struct:

Code:

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struct Player
{
    std::string name;
    int nId;
};

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I'm not familiar with the std::string syntax. What does "::" mean in the context?

http://www.cplusplus.com/doc/tutorial/namespaces.html

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Elysia

If you need to associate an id with a certain player, use a struct:

Code:

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struct Player
{
    std::string name;
    int nId;
};

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How would do if you later wanted to cout the whole Player struct using only the Id of a certain player?

For example, if you have

Code:

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 struct data
    {
          int id;
          string player;
          string partner;
          string team;
    };

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And want to associate an id with all of those strings?
So that a certain player, partner and team, will be associated with that id?



NEXT question is: How do you do if you want to request only 1 specific STRING from the struct, using only the id?

Then you would use a map. Use the id as a key and the struct (possible a pointer) as the data.
In that way, you can search in the map for the struct associated with the id. Inside the struct is all the data about the player, so you can pick the data you want from the struct.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Elysia

Then you would use a map. Use the id as a key and the struct (possible a pointer) as the data.
In that way, you can search in the map for the struct associated with the id. Inside the struct is all the data about the player, so you can pick the data you want from the struct.

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How would you do that in the example provided?

Code:

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std::map<int, Player> mIdToPlayer;
mIdToPlayer[Id] = struct;
std::map<int, Player>::iterator i = mIdToPlayer.lookup(Id);
if (i != mIdToPlayer.end())
    Player struct = i->second;

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