Alphabetic Pattern Pyramid

Question

I want to know if I can improve this program. Its goal is to print a pattern in a pyramid form, by first receiving a letter. The first row is always 'A', only. Then 'ABA', then 'ABCBA'. Increasing order, then decreasing.

#include <stdio.h>

int main(void)
{
    char alphabet[26] = "ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ";
    char letter;

    printf("Enter an uppercase letter: ");
    scanf("%c", &letter);

    letter -= 65;

    for (int row = 0; row <= letter; row++)
    {
        for (int spaces = letter; spaces > row; spaces--)
            printf(" ");

        for (char letter2 = 0; letter2 <= row; letter2++)
            printf("%c", alphabet[letter2]);

        for (char letter3 = 0 + row; --letter3 >= 0; )
            printf("%c", alphabet[letter3]);

        printf("\n");
    }
}

Answer 1

Instead of having a static array of chars You could just use ASCII values from 0x41 to 0x5A. If You still insist having a static array, please consider marking it as a const.

Leaving Your int main() without any return value --- sign of the bad taste, to say the least. Consider having some proper error codes or at least return 0 on proper exit.

Your index of chars (letter2, letter3) can't be negative, so why would You use int instead of uint_* or size_t? Same applies to row and spaces variables.

In case of single char, putchar() is way faster then printf("%c", character).

Answer 2

I assume you are requesting a 2d ASCII representational filling of an equilateral triangle using an incremental basic Latin ascended alphabetical array.

Array("a","b","c"...)

First we need to determine the parameters of the 'pyramid' I will use 25 x 13. I will also assume you want to draw down from the top.

[ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][A][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ]
[ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][A][B][A][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ]
[ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][A][B][C][D][E][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ]
[ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][A][B][C][D][E][F][G][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ]
[ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][A][B][C][D][E][F][G][H][I][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ]
[ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][A][B][C][D][E][F][G][H][I][J][K][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ]
[ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][A][B][C][D][E][F][G][H][I][J][K][L][M][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ]
[ ][ ][ ][ ][ ][A][B][C][D][E][F][G][H][I][J][K][L][M][N][O][ ][ ][ ][ ][ ]
[ ][ ][ ][ ][A][B][C][D][E][F][G][H][I][J][K][L][M][N][O][P][Q][ ][ ][ ][ ]
[ ][ ][ ][A][B][C][D][E][F][G][H][I][J][K][L][M][N][O][P][Q][R][S][ ][ ][ ]
[ ][ ][A][B][C][D][E][F][G][H][I][J][K][L][M][N][O][P][Q][R][S][T][U][ ][ ]
[ ][A][B][C][D][E][F][G][H][I][J][K][L][M][N][O][P][Q][R][S][T][U][V][W][ ]
[A][B][C][D][E][F][G][H][I][J][K][L][M][N][O][P][Q][R][S][T][U][V][W][X][Y]

Notice the [ ] these will need to be empty spaces for design purposes.

int main(void){
     unsigned short int dimensions[2] = [25, 13];
     unsigned short int n_characters = 1;
     for(unsigned short int row=0; row <= dimensions[1]-1; row++){
           printf("%c", alpha_string(n_characters);
           n_characters += 2;
     }
     return 0;
}
char* alpha_string(unsigned short int n_characters, unsigned short int width){
     char label[26] = "ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ";
     char ret[n_characters];
     for (unsigned short int i= 0; i<= width-n_characters; i++){
          ret[i] = " ";
     }
     for (unsigned short int i= 0; i<= n_characters; i++){
          ret[i] = label[i];
     }
     return ret;
}

Consider this pseudo code, i free handed this without error checks.