Member Avatar for SpottyBlue

I am kind of new creating the A1Z26 cipher generator. But this has a problem.
Only the program generates the last two numbers. What's wrong?

#include <iostream>
#include <ostream>
#include <string>

using namespace std;

int i; // Counter
char str1[101]; // A string of characters for generator.
string str2, str3; // Adds a string
string str4; // Generated number.

int nochar; // Number of characters.

int a1z26()
{
    for (int i = 0; i < nochar; i++)
    {
        if (str1[i] == 'a')
        {
            str2 = "1-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'b')
        {
            str2 = "2-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'c')
        {
            str2 = "3-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'd')
        {
            str2 = "4-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'e')
        {
            str2 = "5-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'f')
        {
            str2 = "6-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'g')
        {
            str2 = "7-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'h')
        {
            str2 = "8-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'i')
        {
            str2 = "9-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'j')
        {
            str2 = "10-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'k')
        {
            str2 = "11-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'l')
        {
            str2 = "12-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'm')
        {
            str2 = "13-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'n')
        {
            str2 = "14-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'o')
        {
            str2 = "15-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'p')
        {
            str2 = "16-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'q')
        {
            str2 = "17-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'r')
        {
            str2 = "18-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 's')
        {
            str2 = "19-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 't')
        {
            str2 = "20-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'u')
        {
            str2 = "21-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'v')
        {
            str2 = "22-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'w')
        {
            str2 = "23-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'x')
        {
            str2 = "24-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'y')
        {
            str2 = "25-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == 'z')
        {
            str2 = "26-";
        }
        if (str1[i] == ' ')
        {
            str2 = " ";
        }
        str3.swap(str2);
    }
    str4 = str2 + str3;
    return 0;
}

int main()
{
    cout << "A1Z26 cipher generator." << endl;
    cout << "Generates a string of characters into numbers." << endl << endl;

    return1:
    cout << "Enter the string (up to 100 characters, no numbers):\n";
    cin.getline(str1, 101);

    if (str1[101] == '0' && str1[101] == '1' && str1[101] == '2'&& str1[101] == '3'&& str1[101] == '4'&& str1[101] == '5'&& str1[101] == '6'&& str1[101] == '7'&& str1[101] == '8' && str1[101] == '9')
    {
        goto return1;
    }

    cout << endl;

    _strlwr_s(str1); // Transforms the letters in a string to all lower-case letters.
    nochar = strlen(str1);

    a1z26();

    cout << "Your generated number: " << endl;

    cout << str4 << endl <<endl;

    cout << "Share this to your friends to decode your mystery!" << endl;

    system("pause");
    return 0;
}
  • 2 Contributors
  • 1 Reply
  • 2K Views
  • 17 Hours Discussion Span
  • Latest Post Latest Post by tinstaafl

Dani AI

Generated

the behavior you see comes from two issues in a1z26(): you overwrite str2 on every loop, and then str3.swap(str2) just ping-pongs the last two fragments. At the end, str2 + str3 is literally the last two numbers only. That is why the output stops there. is right about the overwrite; you want to accumulate, not replace.

If you want to keep your current shape, a minimal fix is to append instead of swap, and trim the trailing dash when you hit a space or at the end. For example: build into one output string and do out += str2; each iteration; when you see a space, first remove a trailing -, then append the space. Also, your digit check is out of bounds and impossible: str1[101] is past the buffer, and a char cannot be equal to all digits at once. If you need to reject digits, scan every character and test with isdigit. Finally, _strlwr_s is a non‑standard MS extension; prefer tolower or std::transform.

Here is a small, safer encoder that preserves spaces, inserts - only between letters, and ignores non-letters. It returns the result instead of mutating globals:

std::string a1z26(const std::string& s) {
    std::string out;
    out.reserve(s.size() * 3);
    bool in_word = false;
    for (unsigned char uc : s) {
        if (uc == ' ') { if (!out.empty() && out.back() == '-') out.pop_back(); out += ' '; in_word = false; continue; }
        if (std::isalpha(uc)) {
            int n = std::tolower(uc) - 'a' + 1;
            if (in_word) out += '-';
            out += std::to_string(n);
            in_word = true;
        }
    }
    return out;
}

Swap this into main, drop the goto, and you will get the full sequence, not just the last two numbers.

Member Avatar for tinstaafl

It appears that your a1z26() method iterates through the string but it keeps overwriting str2 instead of adding to it.

You might be over thinking this a bit. Since char is basically an int, if you cast it to an int, all you need is a simple offset to get the substitution number, and then convert it to a string, your code becomes much simpler:

#include <iostream>
#include<string>
#include<sstream>
using namespace std;

int main()
{
    string str1 = "", str2 = "";
    cout << "A1Z26 cipher generator." << endl;
    cout << "Generates a string of characters into numbers." << endl << endl;
    cout << "Enter the string (up to 100 characters, no numbers):\n";
    //Get input string.  Use newline as terminator and store the string in str1
    getline(cin,str1,'\n');
    //truncate str1 to 100 characters
    str1 = str1.substr(0,100);
    for(int i=0;i <str1.length();i++)
    {
        stringstream ss;
        string temp = "";
        if(isalpha(str1[i]) || str[i] == ' ')
        {
            //break up  the string with spaces in the same places.  This trim the '-' off the end before adding the space.
            if(str1[i] == ' ')
            {
                str2 = str2.substr(0, str2.length() -1) + str[i];
            }
            else
            {
                //convert the char to int and substract the offset
                //stringstream is an easy way to convert numbers to strings.
                ss << (int)(tolower(str1[i])-96);
                ss >> temp;                
                str2 += temp + "-";
            }
        }
    }
    //Trim the '-' off the final string
    str2= str2.substr(0, str2.length() -1);
    cout << "Your generated number: " << endl;
    cout << str2 << endl <<endl;
    cout << "Share this to your friends to decode your mystery!" << endl;
    system("pause");
    return 0;
}

This code truncates the input string to 100 characters and ignores any non-alphabet characters.

Edited by tinstaafl
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