Searching Within Strings

Method find()

Sometimes, you may need to search for specific text within a string. This can be done using the .find() or .rfind() methods. Let’s begin with the .find() method.

find

str.find("text to find")


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str.find("text to find")

It returns the index of the first character of the first match.

main

#include <iostream>

int main()

{

std::string str = "codecodefinity";

std::cout << str.find("code") << std::endl; // (code)codefinity

}


              1234567
            
#include <iostream>

int main()
{
    std::string str = "codecodefinity";
    std::cout << str.find("code") << std::endl; // (code)codefinity
}

You can also specify the position of the first character in the string to be considered in the search. It can be done using the pos argument. Any characters before the pos index are ignored in a search.

Here is an example of finding the first "code" starting from a 3-rd character.

main

#include <iostream>

int main()

{

std::string str = "codecodefinity";

std::cout << str.find("code", 3) << std::endl; // __de(code)finity

}


              1234567
            
#include <iostream>

int main()
{
    std::string str = "codecodefinity";
    std::cout << str.find("code", 3) << std::endl; // __de(code)finity
}

Method rfind()

You can also locate the last occurrence of some text using the .rfind() method.

rfind

str.rfind("text to find")


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str.rfind("text to find")

While .find() retrieves the first occurrence of text, .rfind() finds the last occurrence and stands for reverse find.

main

#include <iostream>

int main()

{

std::string str = "codecodefinity";

std::cout << str.find("code") << std::endl;

std::cout << str.rfind("code") << std::endl;

}


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#include <iostream>

int main()
{
    std::string str = "codecodefinity";
    std::cout << str.find("code") << std::endl;
    std::cout << str.rfind("code") << std::endl;
}

Note

If no match is found, both .find() and .rfind() return a special value, string::npos. This value represents no position and indicates that the search was unsuccessful.

main

#include <iostream>

int main()

{

std::string str = "codecodefinity";

std::cout << str.rfind("abc") << endl;

std::cout << std::string::npos << endl;

}


              12345678
            
#include <iostream>

int main()
{
    std::string str = "codecodefinity";
    std::cout << str.rfind("abc") << endl;
    std::cout << std::string::npos << endl;
}

Tehtävä

Swipe to start coding

Create a program that prints "Found code" if the string contains "code", and "No code" if it doesn’t.

Write a condition to check for no match using .find() or .rfind(). Refer to the hint if needed.
Replace the "___" placeholders with "Found code" or "No code", based on your if statement.