Computer Language II

Lecture 5: Strings

Dr. Khari Armih

khari.armih@gmail.com

June 16, 2023

Dr. Khari Armih (khari.armih@gmail.com) Computer Language II June 16, 2023 1 / 22

 Outline
❶ What is string
❷ Type of string
❸ The C-Style String Library

Dr. Khari Armih (khari.armih@gmail.com) Computer Language II June 16, 2023 2 / 22

 String
• Series of characters treated as single unit
• Can include letters, digits, special characters +,-,* .....
• Enclosed in double quotes
– ”Computer language”
• Array of characters, ends with null character ’\0’
• String is constant pointer
– pointer to the first character

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 Type of String
• C++ provides following two types of string representations:
– The C-style character string
– The string class type introduced with Standard C++

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 The C-Style Character String
• String assignment

char str1[5] = {’H’,’e’,’l’,’l’,’o’};

or

char str2[] = "Hello";

• The C++ compiler automatically places the ’\0’ at the end of the
string when it initializes the array

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 Taking String Input
1 #include <iostream>
2 using namespace std;
3

4 int main()
5 {
6 char name[30];
7 cout << "What is your name: ";
8 cin >> name;
9 cout << "Hi, " << name;
10 return 0;
11 }

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 Sample run
What is your name: Khari
Hi, Khari

What is your name: Khari Armih

Hi, Khari

Dr. Khari Armih (khari.armih@gmail.com) Computer Language II June 16, 2023 7 / 22

 Using cin.get() Function
1 #include <iostream>
2 using namespace std;
3 int main()
4 {
5 char name[30];
6 cout << "What is your name: ";
7 cin.get(name,30);
8 cout << "Hi, " << name;
9 return 0;
10 }

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 Sample run
What is your name: Khari Amer Armih
Hi, Khari Amer Armih

Dr. Khari Armih (khari.armih@gmail.com) Computer Language II June 16, 2023 9 / 22

 Using loop to print a string
1 #include <iostream>
2 using namespace std;
3 int main()
4 {
5 char str[] ="Programming is fun!";
6 int i=0;
7 while(str[i]!=’\0’)
8 {
9 cout << str[i];
10 i++;
11 }
12 return 0;
13 }

Dr. Khari Armih (khari.armih@gmail.com) Computer Language II June 16, 2023 10 / 22

 The C-Style String Library
• The more commonly-used string functions:
– strcat - concatenate two strings
– strchr - string scanning operation
– strcmp - compare two strings
– strcpy - copy a string
– strlen - get string length
– strncat - concatenate one string with part of another
– strncmp - compare parts of two strings
– strncpy - copy part of a string
• You must include cstring library

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 Full Example
1 #include <iostream>
2 #include<cstring>
3 using namespace std;
4 int main()
5 {
6 char line[] ="I am studying computer language.";
7
8 cout << "line: " << line << endl;
9
10 cout <<"strlen(line): "<< strlen(line) << endl;
11
12 strcat(line," How about you?");
13
14 cout << "line: " << line << endl;
15
16 char newline[100];
17
18 strcpy(newline, line);
19
20 cout << "strcpy(newline, line): " << newline << endl;
21
22 return 0;
23 }
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 Sample run
line: I am studying computer language.
strlen(line): 32
line: I am studying computer language. How about
you?
strcpy(newline, line): I am studying computer
language. How about you?

Dr. Khari Armih (khari.armih@gmail.com) Computer Language II June 16, 2023 13 / 22

 Passing string to function
1 #include <iostream>
2 #include<cstring>
3 using namespace std;
4
5 int len(char *str)
6 {
7 int c=0;
8 while(str[c] != ’\0’)
9 c++;
10 return c;
11 }
12
13 int main()
14 {
15 char line[] ="I am studying computer language.";
16
17 cout <<"strlen(line): "<< strlen(line) << endl;
18
19 cout << "len(line): " << len(line) << endl;
20
21 return 0;
22 }
Dr. Khari Armih (khari.armih@gmail.com) Computer Language II June 16, 2023 14 / 22
 Sample run
strlen(line): 32
len(line): 32

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 In-Class Exercise
1 void mystrcpy(char *str1, char *str2)
2 {
3 int i=0;
4 while(str1[i] != ’\0’)
5 {
6 str2[i] = str1[i];
7 i++;
8 }
9 str2[i]= ’\0’;
10 }

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 The String Class in C++
• C++ has a ¡string¿ library
• Include it in your programs when you wish to use strings:
#include < string >
• In this library, a class string is defined and implemented
• It is very convenient and makes string processing easier than in C

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 Declaration of strings
• The following instructions are all equivalent
– string str = "Computer Language";
– string str = ("Computer Language");
• They declare str to be an object of type string, and assign the
string ”Computer Language”

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 Operation on strings
• Concatenation (+)

1 #include <iostream>
2 #include<string>
3 using namespace std;
4 int main()
5 {
6 string str1 ="I am studying computer language.";
7 string str2;
8 str2 = str1 + " What about you?";
9 cout << "str2: " << str2 << endl;
10 return 0;
11 }

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 Comparison Operators
• We can compare two strings x and y using the following
operators: ==, !=, <, <=, >, >=
• The comparison is alphabetical
• The outcome of each comparison is: true or false

Dr. Khari Armih (khari.armih@gmail.com) Computer Language II June 16, 2023 20 / 22

 In-Class Exercise
1 #include <iostream>
2 #include<string>
3 using namespace std;
4 int main()
5 {
6 string str1 ="I am studying computer language.";
7 string str2;
8

9 str2 = str1 + " What about you?";

10 if(str1 == str2)
11 cout << "They are equal"<< endl;
12 else
13 cout << "They are not equal"<< endl;
14

15 return 0;
16 }
Dr. Khari Armih (khari.armih@gmail.com) Computer Language II June 16, 2023 21 / 22
 lab 5
• Write an efficient functions to implement strcat and strcmp
functions in C++
• Write C++ function that swap two strings
• Write C++ program to find the number of words in a given
sentence

Dr. Khari Armih (khari.armih@gmail.com) Computer Language II June 16, 2023 22 / 22