Readability counting letters advice

Question

I can't get to compile the readability program second part, that is counting the letters and outputting an integer. I've tried everything. I'm not asking for a solution, but for a hint at what my undoing is here. Thank you.

#include <stdio.h>
#include <cs50.h>
#include <ctype.h>

int main(void)
{
    string paragraph = get_string("Text: ");

char n = '\0';

int count_letters;

for(int i = 0; i > 0; i++)

return
printf("%i \n", n);

{   while
    (count_letters (isalpha));
}
}

Answer 1

I am unfamiliar with the exact problem you are working on, but one thing I see right away is that your for loop doesn't go anywhere - you say

for(int i = 0; i > 0; i++)

but then don't have anything happen under that condition. Usually it'd be

for(int i = 0; i > 0; i++)
{
    whatever you are putting in here
}

Additionally, your for loop won't work because you have i set to 0 but then have it going while i > 0, which it's not. So it will get stuck.

Hope that was helpful.

Answer 2

First, there's no semicolon after return. But, that's a moot point. The return statement will cause the program to terminate immediately. It needs to be the last line in the program, before the last closing curly brace.

Next, the while loop is fatally flawed and the compiler can't make heads or tails of it. This is what's there:

{   while
    (count_letters (isalpha));
}

The correct structure of a while loop is this:

while (some_test_goes_here)
{
    //code to do in the loop goes between curly braces
}

In both cases, note the placement of the curly braces and how they are different.

This should help you along. Happy coding! ;-)

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