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cwindowsterminalconsole

How can you print out different strings in different coordinates?

I have to make a table and I don't want to hard code it.

COORD point = { 30, 10 };
SetConsoleCursorPosition(hConsole, point);
printf("%s", a);
COORD point1 = { 30,12 };
SetConsoleCursorPosition(hConsole, point1);
printf("%s", b);
COORD point2 = { 30,14 };
SetConsoleCursorPosition(hConsole, point2);
printf("%s", c);
COORD point3 = { 30,16 };
SetConsoleCursorPosition(hConsole, point3);
printf("%s", d);
COORD point4 = { 30,18 };
SetConsoleCursorPosition(hConsole, point4);
printf("%s", e);
COORD point5 = { 50,10 };
SetConsoleCursorPosition(hConsole, point5);
printf("%s", f);
COORD point6 = { 50,12 };
SetConsoleCursorPosition(hConsole, point6);
printf("%s", g);
COORD point7 = { 50,14 };
SetConsoleCursorPosition(hConsole, point7);
printf("%s", h);
COORD point8 = { 50,16 };
SetConsoleCursorPosition(hConsole, point8);
printf("%s", k);
COORD point9 = { 50,18 };
SetConsoleCursorPosition(hConsole, point9);
printf("%d", l);

Basically I have this and I'm interested if I can make this through for loop or something like that

Solution

  • It is generally not a good idea to have many variables named point1 to point9, as this will not allow you to use them in a loop. However, if you instead have these variables in a single array, then you can use them in a loop.

    The same applies to the variables named a to l.

    This is what your code could look like if you use arrays and loops instead:

    // The following array should contain the values of
// the variables "a" to "l"
char *strings[10];
// TODO: initialize the elements in the strings array
//       to the appropriate values

COORD points[10];

for ( int i = 0; i < 2; i++ )
{
    for ( int j = 0; j < 5; j++ )
    {
        points[i*5+j].X = 30 + i * 20;
        points[i*5+j].Y = 10 + j * 2;
        SetConsoleCursorPosition( hConsole, points[i*5+j] );
        printf( "%s", strings[i*5+j] );
    }
}

    However, you probably don't need to remember the coordinates after having passed them to SetConsoleCursurPosition. In that case, you don't need an array of coordinates, so the code can be simplified to the following:

    // The following array should contain the values of
// the variables "a" to "l"
char *strings[10];
// TODO: initialize the elements in the strings array
//       to the appropriate values

for ( int i = 0; i < 2; i++ )
{
    for ( int j = 0; j < 5; j++ )
    {
        COORD point;

        point.X = 30 + i * 20;
        point.Y = 10 + j * 2;
        SetConsoleCursorPosition( hConsole, point );
        printf( "%s", strings[i*5+j] );
    }
}

    Depending on the situation, you may also prefer to use a 2D array (i.e. an array of arrays), for example like in the following code. I have changed the code to use macro constants too, because that is cleaner.

    The following code should be at the start of the file, outside any function, best below the #include directives of the file:

    #define NUM_COLS 2
#define NUM_ROWS 5
#define LEFT_MARGIN 30
#define COLUMN_WIDTH 20
#define TOP_MARGIN 10
#define ROW_HEIGHT 2

    Then you can use for example the following code inside the function:

    const char *strings[NUM_COLS][NUM_ROWS] =
{
    {
        "string for first column, first row",
        "string for first column, second row",
        "string for first column, third row",
        "string for first column, fourth row",
        "string for first column, fifth row"
    },

    {
        "string for second column, first row",
        "string for second column, second row",
        "string for second column, third row",
        "string for second column, fourth row",
        "string for second column, fifth row"
    }
};

for ( int i = 0; i < NUM_COLS; i++ )
{
    for ( int j = 0; j < NUM_ROWS; j++ )
    {
        COORD point;

        point.X = LEFT_MARGIN + i * COLUMN_WIDTH;
        point.Y =  TOP_MARGIN + j * ROW_HEIGHT;
        SetConsoleCursorPosition( hConsole, point );
        printf( "%s", strings[i][j] );
    }
}

    Note that the placeholder strings should be changed to be made shorter, because they won't actually fit in the column, because in your example, the column only has room for 20 characters.

    The code above assumes that the COORD structure that you are using is this one from the Windows API.

    In the comments section, you stated that the variables a to l did not all have the same type. You stated that one of the variables had a different type. In that case, the situation is more complicated, and it would probably be better to handle the variable with a different type outside the loop, or to maybe convert that variable to a string before the loop, so that they can all be handled the same way.