Basic Xcode - reference in random number generator not working - ios

Question

I am working on a very basic (I think) program in Xcode. I am trying to write an app for "drawing straws" where the last person who is chosen is the loser. There are a few things I'd like to do. First, see the code below:
import UIKit
let players = 4
var playerNames: [String] = ["John", "Tyler", "Pete", "Dave"]
var draw = Int(arc4random_uniform(4))
playerNames.removeAtIndex(draw)
print(playerNames)
let round2 = playerNames.count
var draw2 = Int(arc4random_uniform(2))
playerNames.removeAtIndex(draw2)
print(playerNames)
let round3 = playerNames.count
var draw3 = Int(arc4random_uniform(1))
playerNames.removeAtIndex(draw3)
print(playerNames)
The first thing that's wrong is I'm currently hard-coding the random integer being drawn in var draw = Int(arc4random_uniform(4)). When I try to reference players instead of just typing in 4, I get an error. Can someone please help explain the problem there?
I'll stop there for now to see if I can fix that, and I'll wait until that is fixed before posting a new question. Thank you.

Answer 1

The function arc4random_uniform() takes a UInt32, so you need to declare the variable players as UInt32
let players: UInt32 = 4
var draw = (arc4random_uniform(players))
For handling the round variables, you would cast the count to UInt32.
let round2 = UInt32(playerNames.count)
You can also refactor your code
let players: UInt32 = 4
var playerNames: [String] = ["John", "Tyler", "Pete", "Dave"]
println(playerNames)
for loop in 1...players {
RemovePlayer(&playerNames)
println(playerNames)
}
And the code for the RemovePlayer function
func RemovePlayer(inout names: [String]) {
// get the number of names in the array
var maxNames = UInt32(names.count)
var draw = Int((arc4random_uniform(maxNames)))
names.removeAtIndex(draw)
}

Answer 2

As Blackfrog already stated your randomization function requires a UInt32
Since you stated that you just started programing I would like to give you some other advice. Your code can be written as:
var playerNames = ["John", "Tyler", "Pete", "Dave"]
for var index = playerNames.count ; index > 1 ; index -= 1{
var random:Int = Int(arc4random_uniform(UInt32(index)))
playerNames.removeAtIndex(random)
}
println(playerNames[0])
This has a few advantages. At the moment you are hardcoding the values for how many players join a game. You will need to re-write an unnecessary amount of code if you want to add a player.
Let’s see what the above code does:
We start by declaring the playerNames adding a type declaration of [String] isn’t necessary, swift already knows that it is this type by its initial value.
for var index = playerNames.count; index > 1 ; index -= 1{
We create a new variable called index this will be set to the amount of items in the playerNames array (4 in this case)
After this we will declare that we want the loop as long as our index is greater than 1 this will make it run 3 times and make sure we are left with 1 item in our array
The index -=1 will subtract 1 from the index after each iteration through the loop.
var random:Int = Int(arc4random_uniform(UInt32(index)))
Here we declare a new variable random this will be of type Integer. Let’s work from the inside to the outside. UIt32(index) will convert our index which is of type Int to a type of UInt32, this is needed cause our random function requires a UInt32
Next up we request a random value which will lay between the index and 0 (thus between the bounds of the array). We want to remove the player who belongs to this random value in our array. To do this we need to convert our random Uint32 back to an Int we can do this by using Int().
Next we remove the player at the index using
playerNames.removeAtIndex(random)
Lastly we print the first (and only) item left in the array using
println(playerNames[0])