Numbers question

[Ragine]

I've googled this question many times and I've yet to come up with an answer.

Here's pretty much what i want to do. So i want to compare numbers(no limit) with one other number. Lets say..

x = 600 (always changing)
b = 802 (always changing)
d = 230 (always changing)
t = 1000 (always changing)
y = 424 (always changing)
z = 532 (always changing)

I want to compare x,b,d,t,y to z and find the closest one. I want to do this every 3 secs, also the numbers are changing every sec.

This is how i want to do it.

o = (Closest Number)

if (z > o)
{
//do something
}

and/or

if (z < o)
{
//do something
}

If anyone has a question feel free to reply I'll give you more details if needed. Thanks again I've been trying to look for an answer for a while now, and I thought it'll be better to do it this way.

[kbw]

You've stated what you want to do, but I really don't understand what you want. Are you having difficulty getting started, or do you have something that doesn't quite work, or perhaps you haven't started yet?

[Ragine]

I don't know where to start? I've read tutorials online with the basic idea but end up not working the way i want it to. Since some has there limit to it, i want to do 100 numbers(or so) and compare it to 1 without using so much code but what I've seen lots of lines of code comes up.

[kbw]

Well, you have all these numbers that you want to compare with z. So you need to find the difference between all of them and z (one at a time) and assign the minimal difference to o.

So the algorithm looks something like:

o <- some very large number;

if absolute value of x - z  is less than o
    o <- absolute value of x - z

if absolute value of b - z  is less than o
    o <- absolute value of b - z

if absolute value of d - z  is less than o
    o <- absolute value of d - z

if absolute value of t - z  is less than o
    o <- absolute value of t - z

if absolute value of y - z  is less than o
    o <- absolute value of y - z

At this point we will have v the closest difference in o.  Now you can carry on with your z test.

if z > o
    do something
else if z < o
   do something else

I hope that helps.

[Ragine]

Thanks kdw, but Im having a little trouble trying to figure out how to use the code you put?

I did..

int o;
int x = 600;
int b = 802;
int d = 230;
int t = 1000;
int y = 424;
int z = 532;

if "absolute value of" x - z  "is less than" o
    o  "absolute value of" x - z

and so forth, im not to good in C++. Can you help me out a bit more...

[Kyon]

What he gave was pseudocode, it states (in text) what you should put as code statements.
http://www.cplusplus.com/reference/clibrary/cstdlib/abs/
http://www.cplusplus.com/doc/tutorial/operators/ (Relational and equality operators)

[Ragine]

Thanks Kyon, but now im having another issue.

I did..

int o;
int x = 300;
int b = 202;
int d = 430;
int t = 1300;
int y = 624;
int z = 132;
void Form1::Form1_Load(System::Object^  sender, System::EventArgs^  e)

{

	if (abs(x - z < o))
		o=abs(x - z);

	if (abs(b - z < o))
		o=abs(b - z);

	if (abs(d - z < o))
		o=abs(d - z);

	if (abs(t - z < o))
		o=abs(t - z);

	if (abs(y - z < o))
		o=abs(y - z);

	this->label5->Text = o.ToString();

}

I get 0 back..

I also did..

int o;
int x = 600;
int b = 802;
int d = 230;
int t = 1000;
int y = 424;
int z = 532;
void Form1::Form1_Load(System::Object^  sender, System::EventArgs^  e)

{

	if (abs(x - z < o))
		o=abs(x - z);

	if (abs(b - z < o))
		o=abs(b - z);

	if (abs(d - z < o))
		o=abs(d - z);

	if (abs(t - z < o))
		o=abs(t - z);

	if (abs(y - z < o))
		o=abs(y - z);

	this->label5->Text = o.ToString();

}

and i got back 108. Im not sure what im doing wrong, ill be playing with the code a bit more and see if i missed something. Thanks again for your help.

[kbw]

abs(x - z < o) is not the same as abs(x - z) < o

[Ragine]

Thanks kbw & Kyon, you solved my question.


Also now I'm wondering how i could get the finished number without adding it or subtraction it. Since you really don't know if you have to subtract the number or add it to the z value? Any ideas on how i could do this?

[kbw]

I don't quite understand the question.

[Ragine]

If i do this..

int o = 45341;
int x = 600;
int b = 802;
int d = 230;
int t = 1000;
int y = 424;
int z = 432;
void Form1::Form1_Load(System::Object^  sender, System::EventArgs^  e)

{
	
	if (abs(x - z) < o)
		o=abs(x - z);

	if (abs(b - z) < o)
		o=abs(b - z);

	if (abs(d - z) < o)
		o=abs(d - z);

	if (abs(t - z) < o)
		o=abs(t - z);

	if (abs(y - z) < o)
		o=abs(y - z);

	int oo1;
	int oo2;
	oo1 = z+o;
	oo2 = z-o;
	this->label24->Text = oo1.ToString();
	this->label25->Text = oo2.ToString();
	this->label26->Text = o.ToString();
}

label24 = 440; //wrong since i added it
label25 = 424; // right since i subtracted it
label26 = 8; // the number that you need to add or subtract to get the closest number.

label25 is the right one.

But i want to find it without adding it or subtracting it, or doing it without get 2 different numbers. Only one answer is right but i get two back so how am i suppose to know which one is right without having to do it manually.

[Ragine]

Any ideas anyone?