Discover the most extended word/phrase within a given array

Question

Discover the most extended word/phrase within a given array

I recently started diving into JavaScript programming. My current challenge involves creating a script that can identify and display the longest word in an array. Here's the code snippet I've come up with:

var longWords = ["Penelope", "Johny", "Aubumayang", "Czechoslovakia", "Slovenia"]
var longest = 0;
for (var i = 0; i < longWords.length; i++) {
if (longest < longWords[i].length) {
    longest = longWords[i];
  }
}

console.log(longest)

The issue I'm facing is that the code consistently outputs the first element of the array as the supposed longest word (meaning longest = longWords[0]). When I attempted to change longest = longWords[i] to longest = longWords[i].length, I ended up with the character count of the longest word instead of the actual word itself. Could you please enlighten me on why my initial approach didn't yield the desired result, and guide me on how I can achieve this task utilizing a for loop?

javascript arrays

Answer 1

Answer №1

if (max < longWords[i].length) {

It might be better as:

if (max.length < longWords[i].length) {

Answer 2

if (max < longWords[i].length) {

It might be better as:

if (max.length < longWords[i].length) {

Answer 3

Answer №2

If you want to organize your array by string length and then retrieve the longest one, you can follow these steps:

longWords.sort(function(a, b) { 
    return b.length - a.length; 
});

After sorting, your array will look like this:

["Czechoslovakia", "Aubumayang", "Penelope", "Slovenia", "Johny"]

You can now easily extract the first item from the sorted array. Just keep in mind that there might be other strings with the same length following the first one.

In regards to your previous code snippet, make sure that longest is initially assigned as a string since it represents the longest word. Additionally, when comparing lengths in the loop, consider using the length property of the current word instead of its index like this:

// Avoid redundant lookups
current = longWord[i];

if (longest.length < current.length) {
    longest = current;
}

Answer 4

If you want to organize your array by string length and then retrieve the longest one, you can follow these steps:

longWords.sort(function(a, b) { 
    return b.length - a.length; 
});

After sorting, your array will look like this:

["Czechoslovakia", "Aubumayang", "Penelope", "Slovenia", "Johny"]

You can now easily extract the first item from the sorted array. Just keep in mind that there might be other strings with the same length following the first one.

In regards to your previous code snippet, make sure that longest is initially assigned as a string since it represents the longest word. Additionally, when comparing lengths in the loop, consider using the length property of the current word instead of its index like this:

// Avoid redundant lookups
current = longWord[i];

if (longest.length < current.length) {
    longest = current;
}

Answer 5

Answer №3

Instead of searching for the longest word, a more efficient approach would be to sort the array in descending order based on the length of its elements using the Array.prototype.sort() method:

var longWords = ["Penelope", "Johny", "Aubumayang", "Czechoslovakia", "Slovenia"],
    sorted = longWords.sort(function (a, b) {
    return a.length < b.length;
});

console.log(sorted);
// ["Czechoslovakia", "Aubumayang", "Penelope", "Slovenia", "Johny"]

JS Fiddle demo.

Additional resources:

Array.sort().

Answer 6

Instead of searching for the longest word, a more efficient approach would be to sort the array in descending order based on the length of its elements using the Array.prototype.sort() method:

var longWords = ["Penelope", "Johny", "Aubumayang", "Czechoslovakia", "Slovenia"],
    sorted = longWords.sort(function (a, b) {
    return a.length < b.length;
});

console.log(sorted);
// ["Czechoslovakia", "Aubumayang", "Penelope", "Slovenia", "Johny"]

JS Fiddle demo.

Additional resources:

Array.sort().

Answer 7

Answer №4

let max_length = 0;

for (let j = 0; j < longWordsArray.length; j++) {
    if (longWordsArray[j].length > max_length) {
        max_length = longWordsArray[j];
    }
}

Answer 8

let max_length = 0;

for (let j = 0; j < longWordsArray.length; j++) {
    if (longWordsArray[j].length > max_length) {
        max_length = longWordsArray[j];
    }
}

Answer 9

Answer №5

If you want to easily find the longest word, one way is to sort the array and then print the first element using arr.[0]

var longWords = ["Penelope", "Johny", "Aubumayang", "Czechoslovakia", "Slovenia"];
var sorted = longWords.sort((a, b) => b.length - a.length );

console.log(sorted[0]);
// "Czechoslovakia"

Another method to identify the longest word is by using the reduce function:

var longWords = ["Penelope", "Johny", "Aubumayang", "Czechoslovakia", "Slovenia"];

var longest = longWords.reduce(
  (a, b) => a.length >= b.length ? a : b
);

console.log(longest);

Answer 10

If you want to easily find the longest word, one way is to sort the array and then print the first element using arr.[0]

var longWords = ["Penelope", "Johny", "Aubumayang", "Czechoslovakia", "Slovenia"];
var sorted = longWords.sort((a, b) => b.length - a.length );

console.log(sorted[0]);
// "Czechoslovakia"

Another method to identify the longest word is by using the reduce function:

var longWords = ["Penelope", "Johny", "Aubumayang", "Czechoslovakia", "Slovenia"];

var longest = longWords.reduce(
  (a, b) => a.length >= b.length ? a : b
);

console.log(longest);

Answer 11

Answer №6

const findLongestWord = (longWords) => {
  let longest = 0;
  for (let i = 0; i < longWords.length; i++) {
    let word = longWords[i];
    if (longest < word.length) {
      longest = word.length;
    }
  }
  console.log(`The length of the longest word is: ${longest}`);
}
findLongestWord(['apple', 'banana', 'strawberry', 'watermelon']);

Answer 12

const findLongestWord = (longWords) => {
  let longest = 0;
  for (let i = 0; i < longWords.length; i++) {
    let word = longWords[i];
    if (longest < word.length) {
      longest = word.length;
    }
  }
  console.log(`The length of the longest word is: ${longest}`);
}
findLongestWord(['apple', 'banana', 'strawberry', 'watermelon']);

Discover the most extended word/phrase within a given array

Answer №1

Answer №2

Answer №3

Answer №4

Answer №5

Answer №6

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