Thread: Java error

Hi all,

Have an issue with my code below where it is giving me the wrong output. Essentially the code is to scan a word entered to see if it contains vowels. Each vowel(regardless of location in the word) has a value, a = 1, e = 2, i = 3, o = 4, u = 5.

My code is giving me widly different values to what I was expecting. Can anyone see where I am going wrong with it?

import javax.swing.JOptionPane;
public class W7Q11
{
	public static void main (String [] agrs)
	{
		String word = JOptionPane.showInputDialog(null, "Please enter a word");
		String wordCopy = word;
		 word = word.toLowerCase();
		String a = "a";
		String e = "e";
		String i = "i";
		String o = "o";
		String u = "u";
		int s1 = 1;
		int s2 = 2;
		int s3 = 3;
		int s4 = 4;
		int s5 = 5;
		int countersa=0;
		int counterse=0;
		int countersi=0;
		int counterso=0;
		int countersu=0;
		int length = word.length();
 
		for(int index = 0;index<length;index++)
		{
			if ((word.indexOf(a)!=-1))
		countersa++;
		else
		if((word.indexOf(e)!=-1))
		counterse++;
		else
		if((word.indexOf(i)!=-1))
		countersi++;
		else
		if((word.indexOf(o)!=-1))
		counterso++;
		else
		if((word.indexOf(u)!=-1))
		countersu++;
		else
		JOptionPane.showMessageDialog(null, "You have not entered a valid word");
		}
		JOptionPane.showMessageDialog(null, "The word points for the word you enter are: " + ((s1*countersa)+(s2*counterse)+(s3*countersi)+(s4*counterso)+(s5*countersu)));
 
	}
}

Thanks for the response.

For example if I input "Hello", I return a value of 10 when I would expect to return a value of 6. Or if I input "Tommy" I get a value of 20 instead of 4. I can't see a consistency in the outputs.

if ((word.indexOf(a)!=-1))

This is not the right way to check through the string for a letter. What you're actually doing is checking the index of the letter you are looking for (in this case "a") and seeing if the position isn't at -1. Which will always be true in this case.

This is the documentation for : String.indexOf(String).

Look for other methods that return individual letters in Strings.

 Scanner scan = new Scanner(System.in);
        System.out.println("Enter letter: ");
        a = scan.next();
        int count = 0;
 
        for (int i = 0; i < a.length(); i++) {            
            if (a.substring(i, i + 1).equals("a")) {
                count++;
            }
        }
        System.out.println(count);
    }

Here is a sample program I wrote up to count the letter 'a' every time it appears in the word saved as 'a'.

Documentation for substring(int, int) :