outputing the highest and the lowest numbers.. help! asap!

[Ange]

Hi! Sorry, I'm a totally n00b but i really need help. I'm really behind in my class and they've moved on to something totally new. I'm still stuck in the back trying to figure out how turing works. Anyways, one of the example questions that the book gave me didnt have an answer to it cause it said answers varied... so i was wondering if you could help me understand this concept on receiving a list and having the turing program output the highest number and the lowest number.

so, as an example.. a guy is trying to selling a car, and his selling cost is $2000.00, but he's willing to go to $1500.00. so he gets a couple of offers and for some unknown reason, since im guessing he just couldn't read the list and figure out which guy would pay him the most, he wanted to set a program that could enter the offers he received. basically, the program is what im supposed to create... which should output:

- the highest offer AND the name of the person who offered it
- the lowest offer and the name of the person who offered it
- the number of orders that he'd accept (like at and over $1500.00)
- the number of orders that he wouldn't accept (under $1500.00)
- the average offer price

so i get the "input a name" and "input a value" part..

so something like:
put "Enter the person's name."
get name
put "Enter the amount that the person is offering."
get offerprice

but how on earth can you make turing tell you who has the highest/lowest price AND their name? and what's the code for finding the average?

please help me... im so lost. ><
thank you!!!

Ange

[wtd]

You'll want to create a record type, where each record stores the name of the person making the offer, and the price they're willing to pay.

Then you'll want a function which iterates through them and finds the record with the maximum price. Since Turing doesn't seem to do so well with recursion and list operations, I'd suggest an imperative approach.

Basically, set the first offer's price to be your starting point, then iterate over the rest of the array of records. If the current offer's price is greater than the previous high price, make the current high price the current offer.

code:

winningOffer = firstOffer for offer in offers    if offer.price > winningOffer.price then       winningOffer = offer    end if end for

Just replace the > with a < to get the minimum offer.

The Turing tutorials section provides excellent tutorials on Records, Arrays, and Loops (specifically For loops).

[Ange]

first off, thank you soooo much for replying to my post... but sorry!! you're going to have to dumb it down.. A LOT. i am a total IDIOT when it comes to computer programming. bear with me. >< please explain again? haha.. sorry again!!

Ange

[wtd]

A "record" takes two or more individual chunks of information and groups them together to describe something more complex. In this case it's an offer a customer is making on a car. An offer has a name attached to it (the name of the customer). That's a string. It also has a price, which for simplicity sake is an integer.

In psuedocode (that may or may not be valid Turing code):

code:

type Offer : record    name : string    price : int end record

Using a record like this means that we can keep two connected pieces of information connected in a way that isn't easy to break.

Now, to create an offer, we just do something like:

code:

var bobsOffer : Offer bobsOffer.name := "Bob Smith" bobsOffer.price := 1800

But we have lots of offers to sort through, so the best way to store lots of things of the same type, that are all related to the same problem is an array.

code:

var offers : array 1 .. 10 of Offer

That assumes we have ten offers. It might be more than that, or it might be less.

Now, we need a way to find the maximum price offered. The basic problem we're faced with is how to find the largest number in an array?

Well, putting aside the obvious recursive solution that isn't well suited to Turing, the simplest solution goes something like:

Create a variable to store the maximum number. Initialize that variable to the first number. Now, go through the rest of the numbers one by one. Compare each to the max number. If it's bigger than the max, make that number the new max.

code:

var numbers : array 1 .. 5 of int := init(3, 2, 1, 7, 6) var max : int := numbers(1) for i : 2 .. 5    if numbers(i) > max then       max := numbers(i)    end if end for

Now, it's easy to adapt that to this problem. Instead of going through numbers directly, though, we're going through records which have a number as part of them.

code:

var offers : array 1 .. 10 of Offer % set all of the offers' names and prices var maxOffer : Offer := offers(i) for i : 2 .. 10    if offers(i).price > maxOffer.price then       maxOffer := offers(i)    end if end for

Now you have the record with the highest price, which means you also have the name of the person who made that offer!

code:

maxOffer.name

The same process just works with a less than operator to get the minimum offer.

[Ange]

lol.. i think maybe cause im dead tired and absolutely brainfried.. but... i HONESTLY do not get it.. haha.. i tried everything you said.. and when i put it all together.. it screwed up.. >< ack. i've been at this for 4 hours.. do you mind showing me the entire code once? i believe it will be on the exam.. which is on friday.. please please please and thank you!!

Ange

[wtd]

What parts of it do you understand? If you don't understand it, showing you the code won't do any good.

[Ange]

Well, I have everything with the variables of inputing the names and the offers.. however, when asked to output the highest value WITH the name.. or the lowest.. i've been trying to do what you've shown me.. and it's not working.. currently the computer lab has closed for the night and i have no turing program on my pc to try anything out on.. i think im getting confused with applying the concepts to the program.. i've never learned in class about arrays or records.. all i know is formatting, "put", "get", "if", "else", "elsif".. etc.. thats about it. so some of the things you've said before, i have no idea how to incorporate it into a program.. maybe it's the order of the commands, i dont know.. im not sure what I'm doing... I've never done computer programming in my life before.. and am very very confused...

Ange

[wtd]

Utterly untested, because I don't know Turing or have the environment available.

code:

type Offer : record    name : string    price : int end record var maxNumberOfOffers : int := 10 var numberOfOffers : int := 0 var offers : array 1 .. 10 of Offer for i : 1 .. maxNumberOfOffers    var answer : string        put "Input an offer: "    get offers(i).price    put "And your name is? "    get offers(i).name    numberOfOffers += 1    if numberOfOffers < maxNumberOfOffers then       put "Input another offer?"       getch(answer)       exit when answer = "n" or answer = "Y"    else       exit    end if end for var maxOffer : Offer := offers(1) var minOffer : Offer := offers(1) for i : 2 .. numberOfOffers    if offers(i).price > maxOffer.price then       maxOffer := offers(i)    end if end for for i : 2 .. numberOfOffers    if offers(i).price < minOffer.price then       minOffer := offers(i)    end if end for put "The minimum offer was ", minOffer.price, " from ", minOffer.name put "The maximum offer was ", maxOffer.price, " from ", maxOffer.name

[Ange]

thank you thank you thank you.. i will test it again at the comp lab todayyy... yay. here's hoping i wont fail the exam! thanks again!!

Ange

[Ange]

Okay.. so far.. this is what I have.. and i keep screwing up.. but the one you gave me.. i can't use... what do you think I should do? I can now separate the two, one in the high category, the other in the low category.. but it doesnt distinguish which one is the lowest or which is the highest.

code:

var offerprice : int var person : string var countperson : int var numoffer : int var lowestoffer : int var highestoffer : int var counter : int var c : real var minoffer : int var maxoffer : int var lowprice : int var totalamount : int var average : int var number : int counter := 0 highestoffer := 0 lowestoffer := 0 minoffer := 0 maxoffer := 0 average := 0 totalamount := 0     put "How many people have offers?"     get number loop     exit when counter = number         put "Enter the person's name."     get person     put "Enter the offered amount."     get offerprice         totalamount := offerprice + offerprice         if offerprice < 1500 then         lowestoffer := offerprice         minoffer := minoffer +1         elsif offerprice > 1500 then         highestoffer := offerprice         maxoffer := maxoffer + 1         end if     average := totalamount     counter := counter + 1 end loop put "The highest offer was from ", offerprice, " ." put "The lowest offer was from ", lowprice, " ." put "The number of unacceptable offers were ", minoffer, " in total." put "The number of acceptable offers were ", maxoffer, " in total."

[wtd]

A quick hint: when you know how many times your loop is going to loop, you can use a for loop.

code:

var numberOfOffers : int := 3 var counter : int := 0 loop    exit when counter = numberOfOffers    % ...    counter += 1    % the previous line is equivalent to:    % counter := counter + 1 end loop

Is equivalent to:

code:

for counter : 0 .. 2    % ... end for

Much cleaner.

[wtd]

Second tip:

code:

if offerprice < 1500 then    lowestoffer := offerprice    minoffer := minoffer +1 elsif offerprice > 1500 then    highestoffer := offerprice    maxoffer := maxoffer + 1 end if

Doesn't check to see what happens if offerprice is exactly 1500.

[Ange]

hmm but the main point of the program is that the person doesnt know how many offers he will receive. he's supposed to get the offer, then just input it in with everything else, and the output should read the highest offer with the name and the lowest offer with the name.

i still have trouble with the name.. how do you do that?

[wtd]

Well, you can also do something like:

code:

var numOffers : int get numOffers for counter : i .. numOffers    % ... end for

If you can use records...

code:

type Offer : record    name : string    price : int end record

Then something like:

code:

type Offer : record    name : string    price : int end record var bestOffer, worstOffer : Offer var numOffers, totalPriceOffered : int := 0 % setup the initial values for the best and worst offers bestOffer.price := 0 worstOffer.price := 0 put "How many offers? " get numOffers for counter : 1 .. numOffers    var currentOffer : Offer    put "Your name? "    get currentOffer.name    put "You're willing to pay? "    get currentOffer.price    if currentOffer.price > bestOffer.price then       bestOffer := currentOffer    end if    if currentOffer.price < worstOffer.price then       worstOffer := currentOffer    end if    totalPriceOffered += currentOffer.price end for var averagePriceOffered : int := totalPriceOffered / numOffers

[Ange]

I can get the number of offers, no problem... but i used the highest and the lowest...

code:

if offerprice <= 1500 then         lowestoffer := offerprice         minoffer := minoffer +1         elsif offerprice > 1500 then         highestoffer := offerprice         maxoffer := maxoffer + 1

but, they don't work.. like, turing will read it as the final offerprice for each of them.. if i typed in 123, 234, 345, 456... turing will read that 456 is the lowest number.. as well as the highest... how do i correct this?