Question

Problem: Creating a video poker game for my internet programming class.

I have everything else working except I’m missing something in my logic down below.
It returns true for Full House when all I have is 3 of a Kind.

I know my logic for the 3 of the kind works. But when comparing the two cards not involved in the 3 of a Kind is where something is wrong.

Here’s the code:

//Calculate if Full House exist
function checkHouse()
{
    $kindFlag = false;
    $pairFlag = false;
    $tempCardValue = 0;
    $temp = array();
    $counter = 0;

    //check for 3 of a kind, save card positions so they aren't tested for a pair
    for($i=0; $i<3; $i++)
    {
        for($j=($i+1); $j<4; $j++)
        {
            for($k=($j+1); $k<5; $k++)
            {
                if($this->Hand[$i]->GetSortValue() == $this->Hand[$j]->GetSortValue() && $this->Hand[$i]->GetSortValue() == $this->Hand[$k]->GetSortValue())
                {
                    $kindFlag =  true;
                    $tempCardValue = $this->Hand[$i]->GetSortValue();
                    break 3;
                }
            }
        }
    }

    //Checks 2 remaining cards to see if they match
    for($i=0; $i<5; $i++)
    {
        if($this->Hand[$i]->GetSortValue() != $tempCardValue)
        {
            $temp[$counter] = $this->Hand[$i]->GetSortValue();
            $counter++;
        }
    }
    if($temp[0] == $temp[1])
    {
        $pairFlag = true;
    }

    //Computes Full House or not
    if($pairFlag && $kindFlag)
        return true;
    else
        return false;
}

Answer 1

Just a suggestion, but you’re implementation of the cards seems overly complicated. It should be easy to do a check for pairs and fullhouses, and what not.

start with a class called Card (this is from memory so there may be syntax errors and what not):

class Card {
  var $index;
  var $suit; // 0 to 3 you can define which is what
  var $value; // 0 to 12, aces are 12 or 0 or you can actually put their value this is just quick and dirty
  function Card($index) {
      $this->index = index;
      $this->suit = index % 13;
      $this->value = index % 4;
  }
}

and then you can add a class called Hand and it would tabulate the result

class Hand {

    $values = array(); // value of cards
    $suits = array();
    $cards = array();

    function Hand($cards) {
        $this->cards = $cards;
    }
    function checkResult() {
         foreach ($this->cards as $card) {
              $values[$card->value]++;
              $suits[$card->suit]++;
         }

    }
   function getPairs() {
       $pairs = array();
       foreach ($values as $key=>$value) {
           if ($value == 2) 
               $pairs[] = $value;

       }
      return $pairs;
   }

   function getThreeOfAKind() {
      $result = false;
      foreach ($values as $key=>$value) {
         if ($value == 3)
           return $key;
       }
      return false;
   }

}

then you can call

$hand = new Hand($arrayOfCards);
$hand->checkResult();
echo "This hand has this many pairs: " + count($hand->getPairs());
echo "Full house? " + (count($hand->getPairs()) + $hand->getThreeOfAKind !== false);

It’d be easy to implement the rest of the card checks in the Hand class:

function checkFlush() {
   foreach ($this->suits as $suit=>$num) {
    if ($num == 5) 
      return $suit;

   }
  return false;
}

etc… I didn’t mean to write so much code, sorry, lol