From edc79d0eda56871fbda3c6dd5952a535e54b7d4f Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: "go-interview-practice-bot[bot]"
 <230190823+go-interview-practice-bot[bot]@users.noreply.github.com>
Date: Thu, 16 Jul 2026 22:02:15 +0000
Subject: [PATCH 1/2] Add solution for Challenge 17

---
 .../JoQCorreia/solution-template.go           | 55 +++++++++++++++++++
 1 file changed, 55 insertions(+)
 create mode 100644 challenge-17/submissions/JoQCorreia/solution-template.go

diff --git a/challenge-17/submissions/JoQCorreia/solution-template.go b/challenge-17/submissions/JoQCorreia/solution-template.go
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..2e500b4eb
--- /dev/null
+++ b/challenge-17/submissions/JoQCorreia/solution-template.go
@@ -0,0 +1,55 @@
+package main
+
+import (
+	"fmt"
+	"strings"
+	"unicode"
+)
+
+func main() {
+	// Get input from the user
+	var input string
+	fmt.Print("Enter a string to check if it's a palindrome: ")
+	fmt.Scanln(&input)
+
+	// Call the IsPalindrome function and print the result
+	result := IsPalindrome(input)
+	if result {
+		fmt.Println("The string is a palindrome.")
+	} else {
+		fmt.Println("The string is not a palindrome.")
+	}
+}
+
+// IsPalindrome checks if a string is a palindrome.
+// A palindrome reads the same backward as forward, ignoring case, spaces, and punctuation.
+func IsPalindrome(s string) bool {
+    
+    //Removes all characters that are not letters or numbers and makes string lowercase
+	pal := strings.Map(func(c rune) rune {
+		if !unicode.IsLetter(c) && !unicode.IsNumber(c) {
+			return -1
+		}
+		return c
+	}, strings.ToLower(s))
+
+    //If string has no characters, it returns true
+    if len(pal) == 0 {
+		return true
+	}
+
+    //Full index of string
+	indx := len(pal) - 1
+
+	for i := 0; i <= (indx - i); i++ {
+    //Loop compares the letters on opposite sides of the string for matches
+		if pal[i] != pal[indx-i] {
+			return false
+		}
+
+		continue
+
+	}
+
+	return true
+}
\ No newline at end of file

From e843032c7da0e41554ccaee5f82a9f0de4748640 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Joana Correia <75225698+JoQCorreia@users.noreply.github.com>
Date: Thu, 16 Jul 2026 17:14:24 -0500
Subject: [PATCH 2/2] Update
 challenge-17/submissions/JoQCorreia/solution-template.go

Co-authored-by: coderabbitai[bot] <136622811+coderabbitai[bot]@users.noreply.github.com>
---
 challenge-17/submissions/JoQCorreia/solution-template.go | 7 ++++---
 1 file changed, 4 insertions(+), 3 deletions(-)

diff --git a/challenge-17/submissions/JoQCorreia/solution-template.go b/challenge-17/submissions/JoQCorreia/solution-template.go
index 2e500b4eb..704aff3f0 100644
--- a/challenge-17/submissions/JoQCorreia/solution-template.go
+++ b/challenge-17/submissions/JoQCorreia/solution-template.go
@@ -38,12 +38,13 @@ func IsPalindrome(s string) bool {
 		return true
 	}
 
-    //Full index of string
-	indx := len(pal) - 1
+    // Convert to runes to safely handle multi-byte Unicode characters
+	palRunes := []rune(pal)
+	indx := len(palRunes) - 1
 
 	for i := 0; i <= (indx - i); i++ {
     //Loop compares the letters on opposite sides of the string for matches
-		if pal[i] != pal[indx-i] {
+		if palRunes[i] != palRunes[indx-i] {
 			return false
 		}