is it possible

[caesar2004]

is it possible to design a program that for example if the user enters

120 for the program to select 0 as it is the last character?

i think so

but how would you represent that as psuedocode? is it even possible? because i know for a fact that string manipulation is a function of any specific programming language and not something as generic as psuedocode...

[mendhak]

Edit (my mistake)

Just say what you're doing


If input is not blank
Get Last Digit
End If

[penagate]

Anything can be represented as pseudocode. Pseudocode is not a formal specification; in fact, it is almost the antithesis of a formal specification: the only real rule is that it follows a logical process.

GET user input
DISPLAY LASTCHAR(user input)

That's just one of a thousand ways that you could write it, depending on how in-depth you wanted your explanation to be. You could be brief:

DISPLAY LAST CHAR OF user input

—or detailed:

DISPLAY "Enter a number: "
READ number
VAR STRING number_text := number TO string
VAR CHAR ARRAY chars := string TO CHAR ARRAY
DISPLAY LAST OF chars

How much detail you went into would depend on the context of the problem.

Pseudocode is most useful for describing algorithms that are slightly longer than that one. For example, you might use pseudocode to detail an algorithm for reading a string from the console using an assembly language. It lends itself well to teaching problems but is not used very often in the real world. For most problems, it's easier just to give the input and the desired output, and let the programmer devise or apply an appropriate algorithm.