{"id":7653,"date":"2026-07-01T00:01:31","date_gmt":"2026-07-01T07:01:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/c-for-dummies.com\/blog\/?p=7653"},"modified":"2026-06-28T12:45:52","modified_gmt":"2026-06-28T19:45:52","slug":"its-all-greek","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/c-for-dummies.com\/blog\/?p=7653","title":{"rendered":"It&#8217;s All Greek!"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2>Difficulty: &#9733; &#9733; &#9734; &#9734;<\/h2>\n<p>My recent <a href=\"https:\/\/c-for-dummies.com\/blog\/?p=7542\">ctype series<\/a> got me thinking: What about coding a specific function that works with a non-Latin alphabet? The first alphabet I thought of was Greek. Why not check out the Unicode values of Greek and see whether you can code a few ctype functions that deal with this character set?<br \/>\n<!--more--><br \/>\nFor this challenge, I present the Greek alphabet, upper- and lowercase:<\/p>\n<table>\n<thead>\n<tr>\n<th>Name<\/th>\n<th>Uppercase<\/th>\n<th>Unicode (Upper)<\/th>\n<th>Lowercase<\/th>\n<th>Unicode (Lower)<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n<\/thead>\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td>Alpha<\/td>\n<td>\u0391<\/td>\n<td>U+0391<\/td>\n<td>\u03b1<\/td>\n<td>U+03B1<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Beta<\/td>\n<td>\u0392<\/td>\n<td>U+0392<\/td>\n<td>\u03b2<\/td>\n<td>U+03B2<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Gamma<\/td>\n<td>\u0393<\/td>\n<td>U+0393<\/td>\n<td>\u03b3<\/td>\n<td>U+03B3<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Delta<\/td>\n<td>\u0394<\/td>\n<td>U+0394<\/td>\n<td>\u03b4<\/td>\n<td>U+03B4<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Epsilon<\/td>\n<td>\u0395<\/td>\n<td>U+0395<\/td>\n<td>\u03b5<\/td>\n<td>U+03B5<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Zeta<\/td>\n<td>\u0396<\/td>\n<td>U+0396<\/td>\n<td>\u03b6<\/td>\n<td>U+03B6<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Eta<\/td>\n<td>\u0397<\/td>\n<td>U+0397<\/td>\n<td>\u03b7<\/td>\n<td>U+03B7<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Theta<\/td>\n<td>\u0398<\/td>\n<td>U+0398<\/td>\n<td>\u03b8<\/td>\n<td>U+03B8<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Iota<\/td>\n<td>\u0399<\/td>\n<td>U+0399<\/td>\n<td>\u03b9<\/td>\n<td>U+03B9<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Kappa<\/td>\n<td>\u039a<\/td>\n<td>U+039A<\/td>\n<td>\u03ba<\/td>\n<td>U+03BA<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Lambda<\/td>\n<td>\u039b<\/td>\n<td>U+039B<\/td>\n<td>\u03bb<\/td>\n<td>U+03BB<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Mu<\/td>\n<td>\u039c<\/td>\n<td>U+039C<\/td>\n<td>\u03bc<\/td>\n<td>U+03BC<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Nu<\/td>\n<td>\u039d<\/td>\n<td>U+039D<\/td>\n<td>\u03bd<\/td>\n<td>U+03BD<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Xi<\/td>\n<td>\u039e<\/td>\n<td>U+039E<\/td>\n<td>\u03be<\/td>\n<td>U+03BE<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Omicron<\/td>\n<td>\u039f<\/td>\n<td>U+039F<\/td>\n<td>\u03bf<\/td>\n<td>U+03BF<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Pi<\/td>\n<td>\u03a0<\/td>\n<td>U+03A0<\/td>\n<td>\u03c0<\/td>\n<td>U+03C0<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Rho<\/td>\n<td>\u03a1<\/td>\n<td>U+03A1<\/td>\n<td>\u03c1<\/td>\n<td>U+03C1<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Sigma<\/td>\n<td>\u03a3<\/td>\n<td>U+03A3<\/td>\n<td>\u03c3<\/td>\n<td>U+03C3<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Tau<\/td>\n<td>\u03a4<\/td>\n<td>U+03A4<\/td>\n<td>\u03c4<\/td>\n<td>U+03C4<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Upsilon<\/td>\n<td>\u03a5<\/td>\n<td>U+03A5<\/td>\n<td>\u03c5<\/td>\n<td>U+03C5<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Phi<\/td>\n<td>\u03a6<\/td>\n<td>U+03A6<\/td>\n<td>\u03c6<\/td>\n<td>U+03C6<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Chi<\/td>\n<td>\u03a7<\/td>\n<td>U+03A7<\/td>\n<td>\u03c7<\/td>\n<td>U+03C7<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Psi<\/td>\n<td>\u03a8<\/td>\n<td>U+03A8<\/td>\n<td>\u03c8<\/td>\n<td>U+03C8<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Omega<\/td>\n<td>\u03a9<\/td>\n<td>U+03A9<\/td>\n<td>\u03c9<\/td>\n<td>U+03C9<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<p>What&#8217;s missing here are various accent and breathing marks, which are part of the Greek language. It&#8217;s considered incorrect to write Greek without them, though for this Exercise I hope that Greek speakers will forgive me.<\/p>\n<p>Your task is to write three programs that demonstrate two Greek language specific ctype functions: <em>toGupper()<\/em> and <em>toGlower()<\/em><\/p>\n<p>The target phrase is: <span style=\"color:green\">\u039e\u03b5\u03c3\u03ba\u03b5\u03c0\u03b1\u03b6\u03c9 \u03c4\u03b7\u03bd \u03a8\u03c5\u03c7\u03bf\u03c6\u03b8\u03bf\u03c1\u03b1 \u0392\u03b4\u03b5\u03bb\u03c5\u03b3\u03bc\u03b9\u03b1<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Roughly translated, this sentence means, &#8220;I uncover the soul-destroying abomination.&#8221; I&#8217;m unsure how often this phrase is uttered in Greek. Still, it uses most of the characters in the Greek alphabet, and I&#8217;ve thrown in a few capitals just to keep things interesting.<\/p>\n<p>Employ your Greek-specific <em>toGupper()<\/em> and <em>toGlower()<\/em> functions to output the sample phrase twice: first in the Greek version of ALL CAPS and then in lowercase. Here&#8217;s output from my solution:<\/p>\n<pre>Original:\r\n\u039e\u03b5\u03c3\u03ba\u03b5\u03c0\u03b1\u03b6\u03c9 \u03c4\u03b7\u03bd \u03a8\u03c5\u03c7\u03bf\u03c6\u03b8\u03bf\u03c1\u03b1 \u0392\u03b4\u03b5\u03bb\u03c5\u03b3\u03bc\u03b9\u03b1\r\nALL CAPS:\r\n\u039e\u0395\u03a3\u039a\u0395\u03a0\u0391\u0396\u03a9 \u03a4\u0397\u039d \u03a8\u03a5\u03a7\u039f\u03a6\u0398\u039f\u03a1\u0391 \u0392\u0394\u0395\u039b\u03a5\u0393\u039c\u0399\u0391\r\nlowercase:\r\n\u03be\u03b5\u03c3\u03ba\u03b5\u03c0\u03b1\u03b6\u03c9 \u03c4\u03b7\u03bd \u03c8\u03c5\u03c7\u03bf\u03c6\u03b8\u03bf\u03c1\u03b1 \u03b2\u03b4\u03b5\u03bb\u03c5\u03b3\u03bc\u03b9\u03b1<\/pre>\n<p>Obviously, you must use wide characters for your solution. Refer to <a href=\"https:\/\/c-for-dummies.com\/blog\/?p=2568\">this series of Lessons<\/a> for assistance. You don&#8217;t need to set the Greek locale for your solution to work; just rely upon the Unicode character values shown in the table above.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Write a custom ctype-like function that works with the Greek alphabet. <a href=\"https:\/\/c-for-dummies.com\/blog\/?p=7653\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7653","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-exercise"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c-for-dummies.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7653","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c-for-dummies.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c-for-dummies.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c-for-dummies.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c-for-dummies.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7653"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/c-for-dummies.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7653\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7676,"href":"https:\/\/c-for-dummies.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7653\/revisions\/7676"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c-for-dummies.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7653"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c-for-dummies.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7653"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c-for-dummies.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7653"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}