Looping for every character in a string in Python decoder ring

Question

I'm trying to make a simple decoder ring in Python.

Example:

a=b, `b=c, c=d, etc.  

I want the script to take an encoded message and output the decoded message.
For instance, I would input "ifmmp" and it would output "hello".

I've been thinking I need to split all the characters up and loop through them and change their chr() or ord() values.

There doesn't seem to be any documentation for this in python.

Solution 1

How about:

s = 'ifmmp'
new_s = ''
for c in s:
    n = ord(c)
    n = n - 1
    if n < ord('a'):
        # 'a' -> 'z'
        n = ord('z')
    new_s += chr(n)
# print('new_s = %r' % new_s)  -> new_s = 'hello'

Of course, this is only handling small letters, not capital.

Solution 2

Forget loops, whenever possible use the features built in to Python:

from string import maketrans, translate, ascii_lowercase
import functools
translation = maketrans(ascii_lowercase, ascii_lowercase[-1]+ascii_lowercase[:-1])
decipher = functools.partial(string.translate, table=translation)

print(decipher("ifmmp")) # 'hello'

Solution 3

from string import maketrans

table = maketrans('abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz/','zabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxy ')

for x in ('pdfbo','qipophsbqi','cmvf/nppo/jo/b/sfe/tlz'):
    print x,' -> ',x.translate(table)

result

pdfbo  ->  ocean
qipophsbqi  ->  phonograph
cmvf/nppo/jo/b/sfe/tlz  ->  blue moon in a red sky

.

Edit

I rewrote the algorithm of Joachim (function better()) and I wrote my own solution not using maketrans() ( yop() ) :

s = '{ifmmp}\t\tcmvf-nppo \n SUNNY ~ ajhabh 14568'

def bof(s):
    new_s = ''
    for c in s:
        n = ord(c)
        n = n - 1
        if n < ord('a'):
            # 'a' -> 'z'
            n = ord('z')
        new_s += chr(n)
    return new_s


def better(s):
    li = []
    for c in s:
        n = ord(c)-1
        if n == 96:
            li.append('z')
        elif 96<n<122:
            li.append(chr(n))
        else:
            li.append(c)
    return ''.join(li)

def yop(s):
    gen = ((c,ord(c)-1) for c in s)
    return ''.join('z' if y==96 else chr(y) if 96<y<122 else x for x,y in gen)


def better_yop(s):
    def gen(h):
        for c in h:
            n = ord(c)-1
            if n == 96:
                yield 'z'
            elif 96<n<122:
                yield chr(n)
            else:
                yield c
    return ''.join(gen(s))

for truc in (s,bof(s),better(s),yop(s),better_yop(s)):
    print '%r\n%s\n' % (truc,truc)

result

'{ifmmp}\t\tcmvf-nppo \n SUNNY ~ ajhabh 14568'
{ifmmp}     cmvf-nppo 
 SUNNY ~ ajhabh 14568

'zhello|zzbluezmoonzzzzzzzzz}zzigzagzzzzzz'
zhello|zzbluezmoonzzzzzzzzz}zzigzagzzzzzz

'{hello}\t\tblue-moon \n SUNNY ~ zigzag 14568'
{hello}     blue-moon 
 SUNNY ~ zigzag 14568

'{hello}\t\tblue-moon \n SUNNY ~ zigzag 14568'
{hello}     blue-moon 
 SUNNY ~ zigzag 14568

'{hello}\t\tblue-moon \n SUNNY ~ zigzag 14568'
{hello}     blue-moon 
 SUNNY ~ zigzag 14568

However , my function yop() is slower than the function better()

.

Edit

Now the function better_yop() has a speed equivalent to the speed of better()
However, better() seems to be slightly faster than better_yop(). Since it is also simpler, better() is the best

Solution 4

I would recommend making the decoder ring a dictionary. Then open the input file for reading, read the file, loop through a character at a time and use the dictionary to translate to an output string. Finally write that string to a file.

View more solutions

Comments

[eyquem]

Sorry, but this solution has some deficiencies. A minor one is that the function must obtain ord('a') for each character c in s: replacing with number 97 would be better. A bigger one is that new_s += chr(n) creates a new string for each character of s. If the text is 10000 long, you see the useless work... A major deficiency is that capital letters are treated indeed, as all the characters having an ord() < 97 that is to say digits, capital letters, characters !"#$%'()*+,-./:;<=>?@[]^_` and \t \r \n and others... More in the edit of my answer

[user1063543]

Yes, I ended up using the maketrans solution, but made a translation table for all 26 orders it could be in, then had the program check for outputted english words, and had the english words written to a file.

[Wtower]

For the record, maketrans is a static function of bytes and bytearrays in Python 3 stackoverflow.com/questions/3031045/…

[Some programmer dude]

@eyquem Magic numbers are never a solution I would recommend.