C#•10h ago

Determine positions of the longest and shortest word inside of a string list

It's for a school assignment. I tried everything and even CoPilot fails. Th problem is that it prints the longest word, but does not print the shortest word. It also messes up determining the position of the word cause adding them up gives the wrong result. Here is my current code, my naming is in dutch sorry.

C#
List<string> words = new List<string>();
string input;

do
{
    Console.Write("Woord? ");
    input = Console.ReadLine();
    words.Add(input);

} while (!string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(input));

string longWord = words[0];
string shortWord = words[0];

foreach (string word in words)
{
    if (word.Length < shortWord.Length)
    {
        shortWord = word;
    }
    else if (word.Length > longWord.Length)
    {
        longWord = word;
    }
}

int indexShortWord = words.IndexOf(shortWord);
int indexLongWord = words.IndexOf(longWord);
int addingUp = indexShortWord + indexLongWord;

Console.WriteLine($"Het langste woord is {longWord}");
Console.WriteLine($"Het kortste woord is {shortWord}");
Console.WriteLine($"De som van de posities is {addingUp}");

Console.ReadLine();

C#
List<string> words = new List<string>();
string input;

do
{
    Console.Write("Woord? ");
    input = Console.ReadLine();
    words.Add(input);

} while (!string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(input));

string longWord = words[0];
string shortWord = words[0];

foreach (string word in words)
{
    if (word.Length < shortWord.Length)
    {
        shortWord = word;
    }
    else if (word.Length > longWord.Length)
    {
        longWord = word;
    }
}

int indexShortWord = words.IndexOf(shortWord);
int indexLongWord = words.IndexOf(longWord);
int addingUp = indexShortWord + indexLongWord;

Console.WriteLine($"Het langste woord is {longWord}");
Console.WriteLine($"Het kortste woord is {shortWord}");
Console.WriteLine($"De som van de posities is {addingUp}");

Console.ReadLine();

So the point is, the player has to list as many words as possible, and when the person puts an empty space or whatever it is suppose to say what the longest word is in the list and the shortest word, and it's suppose to add up the position of the short and long word and print that as well. I'm stuck idk

51 Replies

markiel•10h ago

What happens if you remove the else?

Angius•10h ago

does not print the shortest word

What happens instead?

It also messes up determining the position of the word cause adding them up gives the wrong result

If you mean the addingUp variable, then I have no idea what it's trying to achieve. It's adding two indexes, so if the shortest word is the 7th one and the longest word is the 4th one, your addingUp is 11 Which, I guess, can make some sense homework-wise, but not something I'd expect anybody do IRL

Kimo_TerapyOP•10h ago

it prints blank yes thats the point but it gives me the wrong number

mtreit•10h ago

You have a fundamental flaw with your do-while loop.

Angius•10h ago

First of all, I'd use the debugger to see what words ends up being Maybe one of the words is an empty string or a null?

Kimo_TerapyOP•10h ago

perhaps, but you're suppose to end the questioning with a white space so how do I fix that so thats probably an issue it adds it to the index

mtreit•10h ago

Think through what happens when the user enters whitespace. Yes.

Kimo_TerapyOP•10h ago

well its adding it to the index so I gotta remove it afterwards or something

mtreit•10h ago

Don't add it in the first place.

Angius•10h ago

Or not add it in the first place

Kimo_TerapyOP•10h ago

right uhm is that even possible with my do while loop if statement ?

Angius•10h ago

if Yes

Kimo_TerapyOP•10h ago

aaaaaaa

Angius•10h ago

Simplest way to do it

Kimo_TerapyOP•10h ago

ok wait ima give it a shot

mtreit•10h ago

Does the assignment require you use a do-while loop?

markiel•10h ago

I tried running your code with removed else

Kimo_TerapyOP•10h ago

it works !!!! thank you sm guys 🫶 such a stupid mistake I didnt see on my own xd

markiel•10h ago

the loop is fine what did you changed?

Kimo_TerapyOP•10h ago

my do while

C#
do
{
    Console.Write("Woord? ");
    input = Console.ReadLine();

    if (string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(input))
    {
        break;
    }
    else
    {
        words.Add(input);
    }

} while (!string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(input));

C#
do
{
    Console.Write("Woord? ");
    input = Console.ReadLine();

    if (string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(input))
    {
        break;
    }
    else
    {
        words.Add(input);
    }

} while (!string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(input));

I just added an if statement to it

Angius•10h ago

With that break you could as well just use a while(true) loop tbh But this is fine as well

Kimo_TerapyOP•10h ago

yea I realized that as well

Angius•10h ago

Just some duplicated functionality

markiel•10h ago

oh, actually, I modified your code - with words.Where(w => !string.IsNullOrEmpty(w))

Kimo_TerapyOP•10h ago

wtf is Where lol

Angius•10h ago

LINQ Usually not allowed in homework, unless specifically discussing LINQ And only if the teacher knows it exists lmao

Kimo_TerapyOP•10h ago

yea ur right thank god the teachers made an autograder for the assignments

markiel•10h ago

oic

mtreit•10h ago

I write almost all loops like this as while (true) and then break out as necessary so the loop condition doesn't have to be complex.

Kimo_TerapyOP•10h ago

i see

mtreit•10h ago

while (true)
{
    Console.Write("Woord? ");
    input = Console.ReadLine();

    if (string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(input))
    {
        break;
    }

    words.Add(input);
}

while (true)
{
    Console.Write("Woord? ");
    input = Console.ReadLine();

    if (string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(input))
    {
        break;
    }

    words.Add(input);
}

However, what you have is also fine for this assignment I think.

markiel•9h ago

you can also do a post processing in the 2nd loop like if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(word)) continue; one liner

mtreit•9h ago

That wastes memory! 🙂

ティナ•9h ago

you can check while reading the input, you dont need a list

Kimo_TerapyOP•9h ago

so much simpler lmao im obligated to use a list here xD i was obligated to use IndexOf(); as well

mtreit•9h ago

Using a list is fine, especially since they want you to use the indexes.

markiel•9h ago

it won't matter 😄

Kimo_TerapyOP•9h ago

ah my autograde gave me my grade

Kimo_TerapyOP•9h ago

lets goo

mtreit•9h ago

For your next assignment, you might want to learn how to use a debugger to step through your code and inspect exactly what's happening. If you had done that for this assignment you would have been able to see pretty easily that the empty string was being added to the list and then could reason about how to prevent that.

Kimo_TerapyOP•9h ago

got it. You know any useful extensions for that or is that too unnecessary

mtreit•9h ago

Are you using VSCode? Or Visual Studio?

Kimo_TerapyOP•9h ago

vs code i can use visual studio but then I gotta prove im a student at this college and what not

Angius•9h ago

Why?

mtreit•9h ago

There is a free Community Edition of Visual Studio.

mtreit•9h ago

I think debugging in Visual Studio is probably simpler, but if you want to try it with vscode there are instructions here: https://code.visualstudio.com/docs/csharp/debugging

Debugging

See how you can run and debug your C# source code

Kimo_TerapyOP•9h ago

alright ik more advanced programmers use visual studio but is it really that big of a difference im in my first year anyway

mtreit•9h ago

For the kind of code you are writing it really should not matter much.

Kimo_TerapyOP•9h ago

next semester we're gonna learn MAUI

mtreit•9h ago

But definitely learn how to use a debugger, it will help a lot.

Kimo_TerapyOP•9h ago

got it I will

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Determine positions of the longest and shortest word inside of a string list

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