whats wrong with this?

We were given sample problems for a programming competition, all of them seem pretty easy. But I cant get this to work, and can't figure out why..

Code:

---

int main(int argc, char* argv[]) {
        char *strDef = new char[50];        //first string
        char *tmp;                                                //string to hold temporary
        register int i;                                        //varable to hold loop

        printf("Please enter a sentence and press <ENTER>: ");
        gets(strDef);

        char *strNew = new char[strlen(strDef)];
       
        if(!strNew)        //make sure its valid
                return 0;

        for(i=0;i<=strlen(strDef);i++){
                //begin checking
                if(strDef[i]==' ')
                        i++;
                else if(strDef[i] == strDef[i+1]){ //check if there are two letters in a row
                        strcat(strNew,(char*)strDef[i]);
                        i+=2;
                } else{
                        strcat(strNew,(char*)strDef[i]);
                        //strNew+=strDef[i];
                }
        }
        printf("Here is the formatted string: %s", strNew);
        return 1;
}

---

It looks like you are trying to remove duplicates

Code:

---


void dedupe(char *src, char *dest){ // dest will be the finished product
          char *buf;
          char *s
          s=dest;
          buf = src;
          memset(s,0x00,strlen(src)+1);
          if(!strlen(buf) return;
          *s=*buf++;
          while (*buf!=0x00){
              if(*buf != *s) {
                  s++;
                  *s=*buf;
              }
              buf++;   
          }
}

---

the task is to remove any spaces, and duplicate lattersm so something like


"this yellow bannana" will become "thisyelowbanana"

what is the "memset" for?

memset makes the string zero-character filled.
You want:

Code:

---

void dedupe(char *src, char *dest){ // dest will be the finished product
          char *buf;
          char *s
          s=dest;
          buf = src;
          memset(s,0x00,strlen(src)+1);
          if(!strlen(buf) return;
          *s=*buf++;
          while (*buf!=0x00){
              if(*buf== 0x20) {
                        buf++;
                        continue;
              }
              if(*buf != *s) {
                  s++;
                  *s=*buf;
              }
              buf++;   
          }
}

---

i guess 0x20 is a space?

so its make copies of the original string, then itll loop through and check whether is a space...or is 0x20 the thing to loop at the next character?

just wondering though, why wouldnt my method work?

is there a way to get around that?