commit 668c7b10b5a6bcaafb9e5c84cdec187e197280ef
Author: Ed Guloien <ed.guloien@gmail.com>
Date:   Sun Apr 26 17:29:18 2026 -0400

    init simple project that reads a file, generates a random lowercase character and writes counts so far to a file

diff --git a/.gitignore b/.gitignore
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ea8c4bf
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+++ b/.gitignore
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diff --git a/Cargo.lock b/Cargo.lock
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..e7d6a82
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+++ b/Cargo.lock
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+# This file is automatically @generated by Cargo.
+# It is not intended for manual editing.
+version = 4
+
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+ "wasi",
+]
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+ "rand_core",
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diff --git a/Cargo.toml b/Cargo.toml
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5e072e9
--- /dev/null
+++ b/Cargo.toml
@@ -0,0 +1,7 @@
+[package]
+name = "char-counter"
+version = "0.1.0"
+edition = "2024"
+
+[dependencies]
+rand = "0.8"
diff --git a/src/main.rs b/src/main.rs
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..d1561a1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/src/main.rs
@@ -0,0 +1,47 @@
+use std::fs;
+use rand::rngs::OsRng;
+use rand::Rng;
+
+fn random_lower_char(rng: &mut OsRng) -> u8 {
+    rng.gen_range(0..25)
+}
+
+fn serialize_data(data: &[u32]) -> String {
+    println!("serializing...");
+    let mut serialization = String::new();
+    for (i, count) in data.iter().enumerate() {
+        let c = (i as u8 + 97) as char;
+        let s = format!("{} {}\n", c, count.to_string());
+        serialization.push_str(&s) 
+    }
+    // only stack object (ptr, len, capacity) is copied on the way out
+    serialization 
+}
+
+fn main() {
+    // considered using mutable static array for data
+    // but that requires unsafe, so we just use non-static memory
+    let mut data : [u32; 26] = [0; 26];
+
+    // deserialize file contents into data structure
+    if let Ok(contents) = fs::read_to_string("state.txt") {
+        println!("deserializing...");
+        for line in contents.split('\n') {
+            if let Some((letter, val)) = line.split_once(' ') {
+                let index = (letter.chars().next().unwrap() as u32) - 97; // todo: handle failure
+                let count = val.parse::<u32>().unwrap(); // todo: handle failure
+                data[index as usize] = count;
+            }
+        }
+    } 
+
+    // generate random char and give to data structure
+    let mut rng = OsRng;
+    let index = random_lower_char(&mut rng) as usize;
+    data[index] += 1;
+
+    // write data structure to file
+    let s_data = serialize_data(&data);
+    fs::write("state.txt", s_data).expect("Should be able to write to `state.txt`");
+    println!("done")
+}
diff --git a/state.txt b/state.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..366c2a4
--- /dev/null
+++ b/state.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,26 @@
+a 0
+b 2
+c 1
+d 0
+e 0
+f 2
+g 2
+h 1
+i 1
+j 0
+k 1
+l 0
+m 4
+n 0
+o 2
+p 1
+q 1
+r 0
+s 1
+t 3
+u 0
+v 1
+w 4
+x 0
+y 0
+z 0