Problem 2602. Did you say please? - Find one string within another without strfind or regexp/regexpi

Created by Rahul K

Solve Later

For a given string sentence, determine if the string word 'please' is present or not. If so, return the string 'OK', else return '...'. The function should not be case sensitive. Please do not use the strfind or regexp/regexpi functions in your solution.

Example:

reply = please('Help me with my homework!')
reply = '...'

reply = please('Please help me with my homework')
reply = 'OK'

Solve

Solution Stats

246 Solutions
66 Solvers

Last Solution submitted on Jan 04, 2026

Last 200 Solutions

Problem Comments

3 Comments

3 Comments

Guillaume on 24 Sep 2014

See the test suite of http://www.mathworks.co.uk/matlabcentral/cody/problems/2513 for an example of how to make sure regexp and other functions are not used.

Rahul K on 24 Sep 2014

Thanks for the tip, modified the test suite and updated the problem description to include regexpi in the list of illegal functions.

Rahul K on 26 Sep 2014

Modified the test suite again, sorry if it affects your solution.

Solution Comments

Show comments

Problem Recent Solvers66

Problem Tags

Community Treasure Hunt

Find the treasures in MATLAB Central and discover how the community can help you!

Start Hunting!