Re: reading memory stream in byte chunks - C# Discussion Boards

5-Sep-22 17:50

Repo: https://github.com/Charles-CarM/Battleship

I am currently building my battleship console application in C#. I have prior experience
building projects with Vanilla JS and in React. I went through a tutorial on C# and could
grasp most of the concepts pretty well. I have jumped into project building because I know
this is where the maximum amount of growth will be as a developer. With that being said I
will lay out the issues arising in my application.

requirements
    *  the ship has a length of 5 
    * ship will be randomly assigned on a 10X10 grid
    * when the ship is hit five times it is sunk and game is over

I am having trouble choosing the best way to implement the 10x10 gameboard grid. With
some searching on the web I have came across the DataTable class, which allows for rows
and columns to be set in a table(I believe this to be the better approach), and I have attempted
to get them displayed in the Console below. Also I know that I can create a 10x10 grid with
a 2D array using int[,] grid = [10,10]; however I have realized that I can't assign the random values for the ship with an already populated array. I would like to get some feedback on how
I can move forward with creation of the gameboard, and random assignment of the ship on the board.

I know this post and my code are a little messy so please excuse me on that part. Any solutions or suggestions you recommend for me moving forward are welcomed and greatly appreciated. Hope you are very well wherever you may be.

using System.Data;


namespace Battleship
{
    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            
            GamePlay ship = new GamePlay("ten", "fast ship", 350);
            Console.ReadLine();

            GreetUser();

            //generate grid

            DataTable gameBoard  = new DataTable("Battleship");
                DataColumn columnA = new DataColumn("A");
                DataColumn columnB = new DataColumn("B");
                DataColumn columnC = new DataColumn("C");
                DataColumn columnD = new DataColumn("D");
                DataColumn columnE = new DataColumn("E");
                DataColumn columnF = new DataColumn("F");
                DataColumn columnG = new DataColumn("G");
                DataColumn columnH = new DataColumn("H");
                DataColumn columnI = new DataColumn("I");
                DataColumn columnJ = new DataColumn("J");
                    gameBoard.Columns.Add(columnA);
                    gameBoard.Columns.Add(columnB); 
                    gameBoard.Columns.Add(columnC);
                    gameBoard.Columns.Add(columnD);
                    gameBoard.Columns.Add(columnE);
                    gameBoard.Columns.Add(columnF);
                    gameBoard.Columns.Add(columnG);
                    gameBoard.Columns.Add(columnH);
                    gameBoard.Columns.Add(columnI);
                    gameBoard.Columns.Add(columnJ);

                DataRow row1 = gameBoard.NewRow();
                DataRow row2 = gameBoard.NewRow();
                DataRow row3 = gameBoard.NewRow();
                DataRow row4 = gameBoard.NewRow();
                DataRow row5 = gameBoard.NewRow();
                DataRow row6 = gameBoard.NewRow();
                DataRow row7 = gameBoard.NewRow();
                DataRow row8 = gameBoard.NewRow();
                DataRow row9 = gameBoard.NewRow();
                DataRow row10 = gameBoard.NewRow();
            row1["A"] = 0;  
            row1["B"] = 0;
            row1["C"] = 0;
            row1["D"] = 0;
            row1["E"] = 0;
            row1["F"] = 0;
            row1["G"] = 0;
            row1["H"] = 0;
            row1["I"] = 0;
            row1["J"] = 0;

            gameBoard.Rows.Add(row1);
                    gameBoard.Rows.Add(row2);
                    gameBoard.Rows.Add(row3);
                    gameBoard.Rows.Add(row4);
                    gameBoard.Rows.Add(row5);
                    gameBoard.Rows.Add(row6);
                    gameBoard.Rows.Add(row7);
                    gameBoard.Rows.Add(row8);
                    gameBoard.Rows.Add(row9);
                    gameBoard.Rows.Add(row10);

           for(int j = 0; j < gameBoard.Rows.Count; j++)
            {
                for (int i = 0; i < gameBoard.Columns.Count; i++)
                {
                    Console.WriteLine(gameBoard.Columns[i].ColumnName + " ");
                    Console.WriteLine(gameBoard.Rows[j].ItemArray[i]);
                }
            }

            Console.ReadLine();

            string coords;

            int[,] numberGrid =
               {
                { 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 },
                { 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20 },
                { 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30 },
                { 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40 },
                { 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50 },
                { 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60 },
                { 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70 },
                { 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80 },
                { 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 88, 89, 90 },
                { 91, 92, 93, 94, 95, 96, 97, 98, 99, 100 }
            };

            int[,] freshGrid = new int[10, 10];
            for(int j = 0; j < freshGrid.Length; j++)
            {    
                coords = Convert.ToString(j);
                Console.Write(coords);

            }
            Console.ReadLine();

            Console.WriteLine(freshGrid[3,4]);
            Console.ReadLine();

            //generate ship
            Random random = new Random();
            int newShip = random.Next();
            
            Console.ReadLine();

            //place ship on grid


            //User input and gameplay logic
            Console.WriteLine("\nEnter guess: ");
            int guess = Convert.ToInt32(Console.ReadLine());

            Console.WriteLine($"\nYou guessed: {guess}");
            //Console.WriteLine(isHit.HitOrMiss());
            Console.ReadLine();        
        }

        static void GreetUser()
        {
            Console.WriteLine("Welcome to Battle! press Enter ");
            Console.ReadLine();

            Console.WriteLine("Enter username: ");
            string username = Console.ReadLine();
            Console.WriteLine($"\nLet's begin {username}!");
        }

        //bool isHit = false;
        //public static string HitOrMiss()
        //{
        //    if (isHit)
        //    {
        //        Console.WriteLine("That's a hit!");
        //    }
        //    else
        //    {
        //        Console.WriteLine("You missed");
        //    }
        //}
    }
}

OriginalGriff5-Sep-22 19:11

5-Sep-22 19:11

Why are you using a DataTable? It's a bit of a sledgehammer to crack a nut ...

You need a 10 x 10 area of "squares" which can contain four values: Empty, Ship, Hit, and Miss. So the simplest way to do that is you create an enum that has all of those values:

public enum Square
{
    Empty,
    Ship,
    Hit,
    Miss,
}

You can then create an array of that:

Square[,] MyBoard = new Square[10,10];

Or two:

Square[,] HisBoard = new Square[10,10];

You can now reference any particular Square via indexes:

if (MyBoard[x, y] == Square.Ship)
		{
			MyBoard[x, y] = Square.Hit;
            ...
		}

Create a method to clear a board:

public static Square[,] Clear(Square[,] board)
{
	for (int x = 0; x < board.GetLength(0); x++)
	{
		for (int y = 0; y < board.GetLength(1); y++)
		{
			board[x, y] = Square.Empty;
		}
	}
	return board;
}

And you can start getting ready for a new game:

Square[,] MyBoard = new Square[10,10];
Square[,] HisBoard = new Square[10,10];
Clear(MyBoard);
Clear(HisBoard);

Then just write another method to load your ships in: it accepts a board as a parameter, calls Clear. and then decides where to put the ships. (Initially, I'd try to write it using "single space" ships to make the code easier, then start working on the more complex shapes you really need).

In fact what I'd do is more complex than that: I'd encapsulate the Square array in a class called Board, several ship classes (Carrier, BattleShip, Cruiser, Submarine, Destroyer) derived from a base Ship class) and let it handle the mundane stuff so that most of the time you are manipulating Board objects:

MyBoard.place(myDestroyer, x, y, Orientation.Horizontal);

MyBoard.Bomb(6, 7);

But if you haven't reached classes and instances yet then a basic array will be fine.

"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
"Common sense is so rare these days, it should be classified as a super power" - Random T-shirt
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Otto_W6-Sep-22 15:51

6-Sep-22 15:51

Thanks Griff for taking the time to read my post and provide meaningful feedback.

Haha I will opt for the nutcracker instead of the sledgehammer moving forward.

I was experimenting with the DataTable class due to the appeal of Rows/Columns in
a table, but that's not the best approach as you've laid out. I follow what you are
saying with the 10x10 area of squares that have the four possible enum values.

Then calling the Square to create the array for the game board. Using the if/else logic to Referencing the specific squares. Next creating the nested x,y for loops to clear the board, and then being able to start the new game by calling an instance of the Square[10,10] grid for each
player.

I follow you on creating a method to load the ships into, and at first trying single space ships(get that working ) before moving onto more complex logic with the ship lengths.

I'll have to do a deeper dive on encapsulating the Square array in a Board class, then a base Ship
class within to create the ships, but this seems like the best approach to implement.

Yeah I haven't had much practice with classes and instances up to this point, but have a surface
level understanding of them.

I am mostly just repeating back to you what you've told me in this post, but it's extremely
helpful for my understanding and guiding me along the way.

Thanks again Griff!

OriginalGriff6-Sep-22 19:19

6-Sep-22 19:19

You're welcome!
If you get stuck, just ask again - we're all pretty willing to help. Big Grin | :-D

Otto_W16-Sep-22 21:54

16-Sep-22 21:54

I am a little bit further along in my Battleship app although
not as far as I'd hoped to be.

So I setup the 10x10 representations with the enum
Square class and values on the board

It feels like I am running into issues with the CheckGuess
Method in the location where I am calling it from, and also
with the values it's returning after the player enters their guess.

I know that I can change TheBoard values because I have done
so in the current code and wrote it out at the bottom with the
changed values displayed. I can't quite understand why those
same values don't show up when the players guess gets passed
into the CheckGuess Method.

{explained as best as possible to my knowledge}

Please help if you have free time

GitHub - Charles-CarM/Battleship[^]

namespace ConsoleBattle
{
    public class Program
    {
        public enum Square
        {
            Water,
            Miss,
            Ship,
            Hit,
        }
        public static void Main(string[] args)
        {
        bool finished = false;
        string message;

            Square[,] TheBoard = new Square[10, 10];
            Welcome();
            Console.WriteLine("X: 0 - 9");
            Console.WriteLine("Y: 0 - 9");
            Console.WriteLine("Enter your guess: X, Y");

            while (!finished)
            {
                TheBoard[7, 7] = Square.Ship;
                TheBoard[7, 5] = Square.Ship;
                string guess = Console.ReadLine();

                void CheckGuess(int x, int y)
                {
                    if (TheBoard[x, y] == Square.Ship)
                    {
                        Console.WriteLine(TheBoard[x, y] = Square.Hit);
                    }
                    else if (TheBoard[x, y] == Square.Water)
                    {
                        Console.WriteLine(TheBoard[x, y] = Square.Miss);
                    }
                    else if (TheBoard[x, y] == Square.Miss)
                    {
                        Console.WriteLine(message = "you already missed here");
                    }
                    else
                    {
                        Console.WriteLine(message = "this spot was hit already");
                    }
                    Console.ReadLine();
                }

                try
                {
                    int xPos = Convert.ToInt32(guess.Split(',')[0]) - 1;
                    int yPos = Convert.ToInt32(guess.Split(',')[1]) - 1;

                    if (xPos > 9 || yPos > 9)
                    {
                        message = "You are off the board, try again!";
                    }
                    CheckGuess(xPos, yPos);
                }
                catch
                {
                    message = "Unable to process coordinates";
                }
                finished = true;
            }
            Console.WriteLine(TheBoard[7, 7]);
            Console.WriteLine(TheBoard[7, 5]);
        }
        private static void Welcome()
        {
            Console.WriteLine("Welcome to Console Battle!");
            //Console.ReadLine();
            Console.WriteLine("Enter username: ");
            string username = Console.ReadLine();
            Console.WriteLine($"\nLet's begin {username} press Enter!");
            Console.ReadLine();
        }
        //static void AssignShip(board)
        //{
        //    Clear();
        //}
    }
}

OriginalGriff16-Sep-22 22:13

16-Sep-22 22:13

OK ... first off, to play battleships you need at least two boards: one with your ships on, one with his.
So write your methods with that in mind! If you don't, when you come to add the second board, you have to mess around with the existing, tested, working code to get it to work with extra boards. And remember, on the "hardware" version of the game, you have a total of four boards: Your ships / his hits, your hits his ships; and the same pair for him.
Guilty Gadgets Battleships Sea Battle Traditional Family Fun Combat Strategy Board Game : Amazon.co.uk: Toys & Games[^]
While you can do it with just the one, it's a clumsy solution that only saves about 10 * 10 * 4 * 3 bytes and makes your code a lot clumsier.

And don't declare methods inside other methods: it makes the code clumsy and hard to read.

I'd start with a class: give it a board area, and add the CheckGuess method to that. Then create four instances of the class in your main method.

public class BattleshipsBoard
   {
   private Square[,] TheBoard = new Square[10, 10];
   public Square CheckGuess(int x, int y)
      {
      ...
      return whatTheSquareContained;
      }
   }
...
   public static void Main(string[] args)
      {
      BattleshipsBoard myShips = new BattleshipsBoard();
      BattleshipsBoard hisShips = new BattleshipsBoard();
      BattleshipsBoard myGuesses = new BattleshipsBoard();
      BattleshipsBoard hisGuesses = new BattleshipsBoard();
      ...

Now all the boards are independant and you can query any of them the same way:

if (myShips.CheckGuess(hisX, hisY) == Square.Ship)
   {
   ...

if (hisShips.CheckGuess(myX, myY) == Square.Ship)
   {
   ...

Your code becomes more readable, and easier to work with.

Give it a try!

Otto_W24-Sep-22 1:09

24-Sep-22 1:09

Hello there!

Yeah that slipped my mind that there are four representations of the board in the physical version. I definitely realize it's better to have two boards instead of just one. (original assigned spec for this project was a single player version with one ship of five values). I've decided to move forward with the dual ship design like you suggested (it makes more sense).

I had tried to declare the method outside of the Main, but I wasn't able to access TheBoard

So I have created a GameBoard class, and then created TheBoard

namespace ConsoleBattle
{
    public class Program
    {
        public static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            GameBoard playerA = new GameBoard();
            GameBoard playerB = new GameBoard();
            GameBoard playerAGuesses = new GameBoard();
            GameBoard playerBGuesses = new GameBoard();
            bool sunk = false;
            string message;

            Welcome();
            Console.WriteLine("X: 0 - 9");
            Console.WriteLine("Y: 0 - 9");

            while (true)
            {
                Console.WriteLine(playerA.AddShip());
                Console.ReadLine();
                //playerB.AddShip();
                while(!sunk)
                {

                try
                {
                    Console.WriteLine("Enter your guess: X, Y");
                    string guess = Console.ReadLine();
                    int xPos = Convert.ToInt32(guess.Split(',')[0]) - 1;
                    int yPos = Convert.ToInt32(guess.Split(',')[1]) - 1;

                    if (xPos > 9 || yPos > 9)
                    {
                        Console.WriteLine(message = "You are off the board, try again!");
                    }
                    playerA.CheckGuess(xPos, yPos);                   
                }
                catch
                {
                    Console.WriteLine(message = "Unable to process coordinates");
                }
                Console.ReadLine();
                //finished = true;
                }

                Console.WriteLine(message = "You sunk the ship!");
                Console.WriteLine("Play Again? [Y or N]");
                string answer = Console.ReadLine().ToUpper();

                if (answer == "Y")
                {
                    continue;
                }
                else if (answer == "N")
                {
                    return;
                }
                else
                {
                    return;
                }
            }   
        }
        private static void Welcome()
        {
            Console.WriteLine("Welcome to Console Battle!");
            //Console.ReadLine();
            Console.WriteLine("Enter username: ");
            string username = Console.ReadLine();
            Console.WriteLine($"\nLet's begin {username} press Enter!");
            Console.ReadLine();
        }

        //static void Bomb()
        //{
        //
        //}

    }
}

When I call my playerA.CheckGuess(xPos, yPos) it is working as intended
in regards to getting the correct value or message back in the console.

I am able to enter my guess iteratively(which I was struggling with)

I have came up with a quasi solution for the ship assignment, but it only
seems to assign one ship value on the board when I wish to have five. Any
suggestions on how I can get five ships assigned?

Cheers for all the help so far,

namespace ConsoleBattle
{
    public class GameBoard
    {
        public enum Square
        {
            Water,
            Miss,
            Ship,
            Hit,
        }
        private Square[,] TheBoard = new Square[10, 10];
        public Square[,] CheckGuess(int x, int y)
        {
            if (TheBoard[x, y] == Square.Ship)
            {
                Console.WriteLine(TheBoard[x, y] = Square.Hit);
            }
            else if (TheBoard[x, y] == Square.Water)
            {
                Console.WriteLine(TheBoard[x, y] = Square.Miss);
            }
            else if (TheBoard[x, y] == Square.Miss)
            {
                string message1 = "you already missed here";
                Console.WriteLine(message1);
                TheBoard[x, y] = Square.Miss;
            }
            else
            {
                string message2 = "this spot was hit already";
                Console.WriteLine(message2);
                TheBoard[x, y] = Square.Hit;
            }
            return TheBoard;
        }

        public Square[,] AddShip()
        {
            Random random = new();

            string direction;

            int x = random.Next(0, 9);
            int y = random.Next(0, 9);

            if (x < 4)
            {
                direction = "right";
            }
            else if (x > 4)
            {
                direction = "left";
            }
            else
            {
                direction = "left,right";
            }

            if (y < 4)
            {
                direction += "down";
            }
            else if (y > 4)
            {
                direction += "up";
            }
            else
            {
                direction += "up,down";
            }

            direction = direction.Split(',')[random.Next(0, direction.Split(',').Length)];

            if (direction == "up")
            {
                for (int i = y; i < y - 4; i--)
                {
                    TheBoard[i, y] = Square.Ship;
                }
            }
            else if (direction == "down")
            {
                for (int i = y; i < y + 4; i++)
                {
                    TheBoard[i, y] = Square.Ship;
                }
            }
            else if (direction == "left")
            {
                for (int i = x; i < x - 4; i--)
                {
                    TheBoard[x, i] = Square.Ship;
                }
            }
            else
            {
                for (int i = x; i < x + 4; i++)
                {
                    TheBoard[x, i] = Square.Ship;
                }
            }
            return TheBoard;
        }
    }
}

OriginalGriff24-Sep-22 1:34

24-Sep-22 1:34

OK. Let's get complicated ... but not too much, and it'll make life easier later.

Do you know what an abstract class is?

Otto_W24-Sep-22 2:45

24-Sep-22 2:45

I have a surface level understanding of abstract classes. I know that it has to do with inheritance however I
have not used/implemented one before.

OriginalGriff24-Sep-22 3:16

24-Sep-22 3:16

That's a good start. Big Grin | :-D

OK, you have a board class, what do you put on the board?
In the real game, you don't add "single square" ships: you add 4 x Destroyer (two squares), 3 x submarines (three), 2 x Battleships (four) and 1 x Carrier (five).

So why not create an abstract base class Ship, which is inherited by the concrete classes Destroyer, Submarine, Battleship, and Carrier?
The abstract class has properties Length and Name which the concrete classes implement. The Name is so you can say "you sank my Destroyer!" without knowing which concrete class it is, and the Length says how many squares it takes.

Add a Add method to your board which accepts a Ship, a top left coordinate, and an orientation (NSEW) and modify your Hit method to see if it's sunk.

This way, the board doesn't need to know what ship it is, and it enforces rules like "you can't put it there because it hang over the side" and such like.

Have a think about it - I know it sounds complicated, but it's really pretty easy when you get the hang of it and it really does make your code easier to write and modify!

Otto_W25-Sep-22 21:20