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I'm trying to make a program where you recursively set an array index to 2^index. So far, I have this:
void powersOf2(int[] array) {
powersOf2(array, 0);
}
void powersOf2(int[] array, int i) {
if (array.length == 1) {
array[0] = 1;
} else {
if (i != array.length) {
for (int n = 0; n <= i - 1; n++) {
array[n] *= 2;
}
powersOf2(array, i + 1);
}
}
}
But currently, it's returning this:
Say, for example, you have powersOf2(array, 0); (array.length = 3). It's supposed to return [1, 2, 4], but instead, it returns [8, 4, 2].
How can I fix this?
Recursive methods are characterized by one thing: they call themselves. Optionally, you should also make sure that you have an exit condition, or else you're creating an infinite recursive loop:
The thing with recursion is that there are only few places where it really makes sense to use it. It's a dangerous thing both because it's more clever in theory than in practice, and also because in a workplace a lot of people won't work right with recursive algorithms. And, lastly, most times it'll use more resources than using an iterative algorithm to do the same exact thing.
To illustrate what I just warned you about, here are 2 ways to implement the "getting an array with powers of 2 of the index at every position" thing, but once with an iterative algorithm and once with a recursive algorithm. It's really easy to get what I meant then: you don't even need comments to get how the iterative method works, while the other one needs some brain power even if it's not very complicated.
Of course, there are a bazillion ways to implement this, so this is only the first one that came to my mind.
void setup(){
float[] iterativeArray = getIterativePowersOf2(6);
float[] recursiveArray = getRecursivePowersOf2(6);
println("The Iterative array:");
for(int i = 0; i<iterativeArray.length; i++) {
println(i + " -> " + iterativeArray[i]);
}
println("The Recursive array:");
for(int i = 0; i<recursiveArray.length; i++) {
println(i + " -> " + recursiveArray[i]);
}
}
// the iterative option
float[] getIterativePowersOf2(int arrayLength) {
float[] array = new float[arrayLength];
for(int i = 0; i<array.length; i++) {
array[i] = pow(2, i);
}
return array;
}
// the recursive option
// this overload is just to make the initial call easier
float[] getRecursivePowersOf2(int arrayLength) {
return getRecursivePowersOf2(new float[arrayLength], 0);
}
// this is where the magic happens
float[] getRecursivePowersOf2(float[] array, int index) {
if(index < array.length) {
// the method calls itself recursively, adding 1 to the current index every time
// which means that it'll eventually reach the end of the array's length
array = getRecursivePowersOf2(array, index+1);
// then it fills the last spot in the array
array[index] = pow(2, index);
}
// and at last it returns the array with one more spot filled, creating a cascade of filling spots in the array until thay are all filled
// the exit condition being the first if check: 'index < array.length'
// once the program gets to the last spot in the array, it stops calling itself
return array;
}
Hope it helps, let me know if you have questions. Have fun!
I have to decide, given an array of numbers, if either heap sort or merge sort will be faster at sorting it, without actually running them. In order to do that I am trying to find good indicators that might harm performance in both cases such as the length of the array, for example.
I have found that merge sort is exceptionally good at sorting almost sorted arrays. In that sense, I am trying to find a good way to estimate how "almost" sorted an array is but I am not sure how to do that.
I have thought about using the means of the result of subtracting each consecutive element in the array but I am not sure if that is the best approach to this problem. For example:
public class AlmostSortedCalculator {
private static final int[] UNSORTED_ARRAY = {7, 1, 3, 9, 4, 8, 5};
private static final int[] SORTED_ARRAY = {1, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9};
private static final int[] UNSORTED_ARRAY_ = {200, 20, 634, 9957, 1, 890, 555};
private static final int[] SORTED_ARRAY_ = {1, 20, 200, 555, 634, 890, 9957};
public static void main(String[] args) {
new AlmostSortedCalculator();
}
public AlmostSortedCalculator() {
calculate(SORTED_ARRAY);
calculate(UNSORTED_ARRAY);
calculate(SORTED_ARRAY_);
calculate(UNSORTED_ARRAY_);
}
private void calculate(int[] array) {
int result = 0;
for (int i = array.length - 1; i != 0; i--) {
if (i != 0) {
result += array[i] - array[i - 1];
}
}
System.out.println("The result is: " + result / array.length);
}
}
The result is: 1
The result is: 0
The result is: 1422
The result is: 50
The result of the means seems to be higher when the array is sorted but I am not sure how reliable that indicator is. I am sure there is a better approach for this, but I cannot think of any. Any suggestions?
First of all, I'd only look at the sign of the subtraction results:
/* returns the sign of the expression a - b */
int sign_of_subtraction_result(int a, int b) {
if ( a < b ) return -1;
if ( a > b ) return +1;
return 0;
}
You may also call this function compare().
Note that usual library sorting functions only use this information and require such compare()-fuctions.
I saw this interview question on a LinkedIn group here
To summarise, if I have an array
[1,2,3,4,5]
and input
3
I require the output
[1,2,3], [3,2,1], [2,3,1], [2,1,3], [1,3,2], [3,1,2], [2,3,4], [4,3,2],...
In no particular order.
I have been thinking about this one for a while now. I have come up with various different ways of solving but all methods use for-loops.
I think it's clear that in order to eliminate loops it must be recursive.
I thought I got close to doing this recursively partitioning the array and joining elements, but with great frustration I ended up requiring another for loop.
Im beginning to think this is impossible (which it can't be, otherwise why the interview question?).
Any ideas or links? The amount of possible outputs should be 5PN, where N is the input.
The following recursive algorithm will attempt to print every subset of {1,.., n}. These subsets are in one to one with numbers between 0 and 2^n-1 via the following bijection: to an integer x between 0 and 2^n-1, associate the set that contains 1 if the first bit of x is set to one, 2 if the second bit of x is set to one, ..
void print_all_subsets (int n, int m, int x) {
if (x==pow(2,n)) {
return;
}
else if (x has m bits set to one) {
print the set corresponding to x;
}
print_all_subsets(n,m,x+1);
}
You need to call it with n = 5 (in your case), m=3 (in your case), and x = 0.
Then you need to implement the two functions "print the set corresponding to x" and "x has m bits set to one" without for loops... but this is easily done using again recursion.
However, I think this is more of a challenge -- there is no point in completely eliminating for-loops, what makes sense is just to use them in a smart way.
Your first thought is right. Every loop can be replaced with recursion. In some languages (for example Scheme), loops are actually implemented with recursion. So just start with any solution, and keep on turning loops into recursion. Eventually you will be done.
Here is a working solution in Python.
def subsets_of_size (array, size, start=0, prepend=None):
if prepend is None:
prepend = [] # Standard Python precaution with modifiable defaults.
if 0 == size:
return [[] + prepend] # Array with one thing. The + forces a copy.
elif len(array) < start + size:
return [] # Array with no things.
else:
answer = subsets_of_size(array, size, start=start + 1, prepend=prepend)
prepend.append(array[start])
answer = answer + subsets_of_size(array, size-1, start=start + 1, prepend=prepend)
prepend.pop()
return answer
print subsets_of_size([1,2,3,4,5], 3)
I don't think the solution is not to use for-loop but there is an optimum way to use for-loop.
And so, there is the Heap's Algorithm. Below from wiki http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heap%27s_algorithm
procedure generate(n : integer, A : array of any):
if n = 1 then
output(A)
else
for i := 0; i < n; i += 1 do
generate(n - 1, A)
if n is even then
swap(A[i], A[n - 1])
else
swap(A[0], A[n-1])
end if
end for
end if
define listPermutations:
input: int p_l , int[] prevP , int atElement , int[] val , int nextElement
output: list
if nextElement > length(val) OR atElement == p_l OR contains(prevP , val[nextElement]
return EMPTY
list result
int[] tmp = copy(prevP)
tmp[atElement] = val[nextElement]
add(result , tmp)
//create the next permutation stub with the last sign different to this sign
//(node with the same parent)
addAll(result , listPermutations(p_l , tmp , atElement , val , nextElement + 1))
//create the next permutation stub with an additional sign
//(child node of the current permutation
addAll(result , listPermutations(p_l , tmp , atElement + 1 , val , 0))
return result
//this will return the permutations for your example input:
listPermutations(3 , new int[3] , 0 , int[]{1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5} , 0)
Basic idea: all permutations of a given number of elements form a tree, where the node is the empty permutation and all childnodes of a node have one additional element. Now all the algorithm has to do is to traverse this tree level by level, until the level is equal to the required length of the permutation and list all nodes on that level
You could use recursion here, and every time you call an inner level, you give it the location it is in the array and when it returns it return an increased location. You'd be using one while loop for this.
Pseudo code:
int[] input = [1,2,3,4,5];
int level = 3;
int PrintArrayPermutation(int level, int location, string base)
{
if (level == 0)
{
print base + input[location];
return location + 1;
}
while (location <= input.Length)
{
location =
PrintArrayPermutation(level - 1, location, base + input[location]);
}
}
This is a very basic outline of my idea.
Here are two recursive functions in JavaScript. The first is the combinatorial choose function to which we apply the second function, permuting each result (permutator is adapted from the SO user, delimited's, answer here: Permutations in JavaScript?)
function c(n,list){
var result = [];
function _c(p,r){
if (p > list.length)
return
if (r.length == n){
result = result.concat(permutator(r));
} else {
var next = list[p],
_r = r.slice();
_r.push(next)
_c(p+1,_r);
_c(p+1,r);
}
}
_c(0,[])
return result;
}
function permutator(inputArr) {
var results = [];
function permute(arr, memo) {
var cur, memo = memo || [];
function _permute (i,arr,l){
if (i == l)
return
cur = arr.splice(i,1);
if (arr.length === 0){
results.push(memo.concat(cur));
}
permute(arr.slice(), memo.concat(cur));
arr.splice(i, 0, cur[0]);
_permute(i + 1,arr,l)
}
_permute(0,arr,arr.length);
return results;
}
return permute(inputArr);
}
Output:
console.log(c(3,[1,2,3,4,5]))
[[1,2,3],[1,3,2],[2,1,3]...[4,5,3],[5,3,4],[5,4,3]]
This question already has answers here:
Algorithm to find elements best fitting in a particular amount
(5 answers)
how do you calculate the minimum-coin change for transaction?
(3 answers)
Closed 9 years ago.
So here is the problem:
Given input = [100 80 66 25 4 2 1], I need to find the best combination to give me 50.
Looking at this, the best would be 25+25 = 50, so I need 2 elements from the array.
Other combinations include 25+4+4+4+4+4+4+1 and 25+4+4+4+4+4+2+2+1.. etc etc
I need to find all the possibilities which gives me the sum on a value I want.
EDIT: As well as the best possibility (one with least number of terms)
Here is what I have done thus far:
First build a new array (simple for loop which cycles through all elements and stores in a new temp array), check for all elements higher than my array (so for input 50, the elements 100,80,66 are higher, so discard them and then my new array is [25 4 2 1]). Then, from this, I need to check combinations.
The first thing I do is a simple if statement checking if any array elements EXACTLY match the number I want. So if I want 50, I check if 50 is in the array, if not, I need to find combinations.
My problem is, I'm not entirely sure how to find every single combination. I have been struggling trying to come up with an algorithm for a while but I always just end up getting stumped.
Any help/tips would be much appreciated.
PS - we can assume the array is always sorted in order from LARGEST to SMALLEST value.
This is the kind of problem that dynamic programming is meant to solve.
Create an array with with indices, 1 to 50. Set each entry to -1. For each element that is in your input array, set that element in the array to 0. Then, for each integer n = 2 to 50, find all possible ways to sum to n. The number of sums required is the minimum of the two addends plus 1. At the end, get the element at index 50.
Edit: Due to a misinterpretation of the question, I first answered with an efficient way to calculate the number of possibilities (instead of the possibilities themself) to get N using values from a given set. That solution can be found at the bottom of this post as a reference for other people, but first I'll give a proper answer to your questions.
Generate all possibilities, count them and give the shortest one
When generating a solution, you consider each element from the input array and ask yourself "should I use this in my solution or not?". Since we don't know the answer until after the calculation, we'll just have to try out both using it and not using it, as can be seen in the recursion step in the code below.
Now, to avoid duplicates and misses, we need to be a bit careful with the parameters for the recursive call. If we use the current element, we should also allow it to be used in the next step, because the element may be used as many times as possible. Therefore, the first parameter in this recursive call is i. However, if we decide to not use the element, we should not allow it to be used in the next step, because that would be a duplicate of the current step. Therefore, the first parameter in this recursive call is i+1.
I added an optional bound (from "branch and bound") to the algorithm, that will stop expanding the current partial solution if it is known that this solution will never be shorter then the shortest solution found so far.
package otherproblems;
import java.util.Deque;
import java.util.LinkedList;
public class GeneratePossibilities
{
// Input
private static int n = 50;
// If the input array is sorted ascending, the shortest solution is
// likely to be found somewhere at the end.
// If the input array is sorted descending, the shortest solution is
// likely to be found somewhere in the beginning.
private static int[] input = {100, 80, 66, 25, 4, 2, 1};
// Shortest possibility
private static Deque<Integer> shortest;
// Number of possibilities
private static int numberOfPossibilities;
public static void main(String[] args)
{
calculate(0, n, new LinkedList<Integer>());
System.out.println("\nAbove you can see all " + numberOfPossibilities +
" possible solutions,\nbut this one's the shortest: " + shortest);
}
public static void calculate(int i, int left, Deque<Integer> partialSolution)
{
// If there's nothing left, we reached our target
if (left == 0)
{
System.out.println(partialSolution);
if (shortest == null || partialSolution.size() < shortest.size())
shortest = new LinkedList<Integer>(partialSolution);
numberOfPossibilities++;
return;
}
// If we overshot our target, by definition we didn't reach it
// Note that this could also be checked before making the
// recursive call, but IMHO this gives a cleaner recursion step.
if (left < 0)
return;
// If there are no values remaining, we didn't reach our target
if (i == input.length)
return;
// Uncomment the next two lines if you don't want to keep generating
// possibilities when you know it can never be a better solution then
// the one you have now.
// if (shortest != null && partialSolution.size() >= shortest.size())
// return;
// Pick value i. Note that we are allowed to pick it again,
// so the argument to calculate(...) is i, not i+1.
partialSolution.addLast(input[i]);
calculate(i, left-input[i], partialSolution);
// Don't pick value i. Note that we are not allowed to pick it after
// all, so the argument to calculate(...) is i+1, not i.
partialSolution.removeLast();
calculate(i+1, left, partialSolution);
}
}
Calculate the number of possibilities efficiently
This is a nice example of dynamic programming. What you need to do is figure out how many possibilities there are to form the number x, using value y as the last addition and using only values smaller than or equal to y. This gives you a recursive formula that you can easily translate to a solution using dynamic programming. I'm not quite sure how to write down the mathematics here, but since you weren't interested in them anyway, here's the code to solve your question :)
import java.util.Arrays;
public class Possibilities
{
public static void main(String[] args)
{
// Input
int[] input = {100, 80, 66, 25, 4, 2, 1};
int n = 50;
// Prepare input
Arrays.sort(input);
// Allocate storage space
long[][] m = new long[n+1][input.length];
for (int i = 1; i <= n; i++)
for (int j = 0; j < input.length; j++)
{
// input[j] cannot be the last value used to compose i
if (i < input[j])
m[i][j] = 0;
// If input[j] is the last value used to compose i,
// it must be the only value used in the composition.
else if (i == input[j])
m[i][j] = 1;
// If input[j] is the last value used to compose i,
// we need to know the number of possibilities in which
// i - input[j] can be composed, which is the sum of all
// entries in column m[i-input[j]].
// However, to avoid counting duplicates, we only take
// combinations that are composed of values equal or smaller
// to input[j].
else
for (int k = 0; k <= j; k++)
m[i][j] += m[i-input[j]][k];
}
// Nice output of intermediate values:
int digits = 3;
System.out.printf(" %"+digits+"s", "");
for (int i = 1; i <= n; i++)
System.out.printf(" %"+digits+"d", i);
System.out.println();
for (int j = 0; j < input.length; j++)
{
System.out.printf(" %"+digits+"d", input[j]);
for (int i = 1; i <= n; i++)
System.out.printf(" %"+digits+"d", m[i][j]);
System.out.println();
}
// Answer:
long answer = 0;
for (int i = 0; i < input.length; i++)
answer += m[n][i];
System.out.println("\nThe number of possibilities to form "+n+
" using the numbers "+Arrays.toString(input)+" is "+answer);
}
}
This is the integer knapsack problem, which is one your most common NP-complete problems out there; if you are into algorithm design/study check those out. To find the best I think you have no choice but to compute them all and keep the smallest one.
For the correct solution there is a recursive algorithm that is pretty simple to put together.
import org.apache.commons.lang.ArrayUtils;
import java.util.*;
public class Stuff {
private final int target;
private final int[] steps;
public Stuff(int N, int[] steps) {
this.target = N;
this.steps = Arrays.copyOf(steps, steps.length);
Arrays.sort(this.steps);
ArrayUtils.reverse(this.steps);
this.memoize = new HashMap<Integer, List<Integer>>(N);
}
public List<Integer> solve() {
return solveForN(target);
}
private List<Integer> solveForN(int N) {
if (N == 0) {
return new ArrayList<Integer>();
} else if (N > 0) {
List<Integer> temp, min = null;
for (int i = 0; i < steps.length; i++) {
temp = solveForN(N - steps[i]);
if (temp != null) {
temp.add(steps[i]);
if (min == null || min.size() > temp.size()) {
min = temp;
}
}
}
return min;
} else {
return null;
}
}
}
It is based off the fact that to "get to N" you to have come from N - steps[0], or N - steps1, ...
Thus you start from your target total N and subtract one of the possible steps, and do it again until you are at 0 (return a List to specify that this is a valid path) or below (return null so that you cannot return an invalid path).
The complexity of this correct solution is exponential! Which is REALLY bad! Something like O(k^M) where M is the size of the steps array and k a constant.
To get a solution to this problem in less time than that you will have to use a heuristic (approximation) and you will always have a certain probability to have the wrong answer.
You can make your own implementation faster by memorizing the shortest combination seen so far for all targets (so you do not need to recompute recur(N, _, steps) if you already did). This approach is called Dynamic Programming. I will let you do that on your own (very fun stuff and really not that complicated).
Constraints of this solution : You will only find the solution if you guarantee that the input array (steps) is sorted in descending order and that you go through it in that order.
Here is a link to the general Knapsack problem if you also want to look approximation solutions: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knapsack_problem
You need to solve each sub-problem and store the solution. For example:
1 can only be 1. 2 can be 2 or 1+1. 4 can be 4 or 2+2 or 2+1+1 or 1+1+1+1. So you take each sub-solution and store it, so when you see 25=4+4+4+4+4+4+1, you already know that each 4 can also be represented as one of the 3 combinations.
Then you have to sort the digits and check to avoid duplicate patterns since, for example, (2+2)+(2+2)+(2+2)+(1+1+1+1)+(1+1+1+1)+(1+1+1+1) == (2+1+1)+(2+1+1)+(2+1+1)+(2+1+1)+(2+1+1)+(2+1+1). Six 2's and twelve 1's in both cases.
Does that make sense?
Recursion should be the easiest way to solve this (Assuming you really want to find all the solutions to the problem). The nice thing about this approach is, if you want to just find the shortest solution, you can add a check on the recursion and find just that, saving time and space :)
Assuming an element i of your array is part of the solution, you can solve the subproblem of finding the elements that sums to n-i. If we add an ordering to our solution, for example the numbers in the sum must be from the greater to the smallest, we have a way to find unique solutions.
This is a recursive solution in C#, it should be easy to translate it in java.
public static void RecursiveSum(int n, int index, List<int> lst, List<int> solution)
{
for (int i = index; i < lst.Count; i++)
{
if (n == 0)
{
Console.WriteLine("");
foreach (int j in solution)
{
Console.Write(j + " ");
}
}
if (n - lst[i] >= 0)
{
List<int> tmp = new List<int>(solution);
tmp.Add(lst[i]);
RecursiveSum(n - lst[i], i, lst, tmp);
}
}
}
You call it with
RecursiveSum(N,0,list,new List<int>());
where N is the sum you are looking for, 0 shouldn't be changed, list is your list of allowed numbers, and the last parameter shouldn't be changed either.
The problem you pose is interesting but very complex. I'd approach this by using something like OptaPlanner(formerly Drools Planner). It's difficult to describe a full solution to this problem without spending significant time, but with optaplanner you can also get "closest fit" type answers and can have incremental "moves" that would make solving your problem more efficient. Good luck.
This is a solution in python: Ideone link
# Start of tsum function
def tsum(currentSum,total,input,record,n):
if total == N :
for i in range(0,n):
if record[i]:
print input[i]
i = i+1
for i in range(i,n):
if record[i]:
print input[i]
print ""
return
i=currentSum
for i in range(i,n):
if total+input[i]>sum :
continue
if i>0 and input[i]==input[i-1] and not record[i-1] :
continue
record[i]=1
tsum(i+1,total+input[i],input,record,l)
record[i]=0
# end of function
# Below portion will be main() in Java
record = []
N = 5
input = [3, 2, 2, 1, 1]
temp = list(set(input))
newlist = input
for i in range(0, len(list(set(input)))):
val = N/temp[i]
for j in range(0, val-input.count(temp[i])):
newlist.append(temp[i])
# above logic was to create a newlist/input i.e [3, 2, 2, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1]
# This new list contains the maximum number of elements <= N
# for e.g appended three 1's as sum of new three 1's + existing two 1's <= N(5) where as
# did not append another 2 as 2+2+2 > N(5) or 3 as 3+3 > N(5)
l = len(input)
for i in range(0,l):
record.append(0)
print "all possibilities to get N using values from a given set:"
tsum(0,0,input,record,l)
OUTPUT: for set [3, 2, 2, 1, 1] taking small set and small N for demo purpose. But works well for higher N value as well.
For N = 5
all possibilities to get N using values from a given set:
3
2
3
1
1
2
2
1
2
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
For N = 3
all possibilities to get N using values from a given set:
3
2
1
1
1
1
Isn't this just a search problem? If so, just search breadth-first.
abstract class Numbers {
abstract int total();
public static Numbers breadthFirst(int[] numbers, int total) {
List<Numbers> stack = new LinkedList<Numbers>();
if (total == 0) { return new Empty(); }
stack.add(new Empty());
while (!stack.isEmpty()) {
Numbers nums = stack.remove(0);
for (int i : numbers) {
if (i > 0 && total - nums.total() >= i) {
Numbers more = new SomeNumbers(i, nums);
if (more.total() == total) { return more; }
stack.add(more);
}
}
}
return null; // No answer.
}
}
class Empty extends Numbers {
int total() { return 0; }
public String toString() { return "empty"; }
}
class SomeNumbers extends Numbers {
final int total;
final Numbers prev;
SomeNumbers(int n, Numbers prev) {
this.total = n + prev.total();
this.prev = prev;
}
int total() { return total; }
public String toString() {
if (prev.getClass() == Empty.class) { return "" + total; }
return prev + "," + (total - prev.total());
}
}
What about using the greedy algorithm n times (n is the number of elements in your array), each time popping the largest element off the list. E.g. (in some random pseudo-code language):
array = [70 30 25 4 2 1]
value = 50
sort(array, descending)
solutions = [] // array of arrays
while length of array is non-zero:
tmpValue = value
thisSolution = []
for each i in array:
while tmpValue >= i:
tmpValue -= i
thisSolution.append(i)
solutions.append(thisSolution)
array.pop_first() // remove the largest entry from the array
If run with the set [70 30 25 4 2 1] and 50, it should give you a solutions array like this:
[[30 4 4 4 4 4]
[30 4 4 4 4 4]
[25 25]
[4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 2]
[2 ... ]
[1 ... ]]
Then simply pick the element from the solutions array with the smallest length.
Update: The comment is correct that this does not generate the correct answer in all cases. The reason is that greedy isn't always right. The following recursive algorithm should always work:
array = [70, 30, 25, 4, 3, 1]
def findSmallest(value, array):
minSolution = []
tmpArray = list(array)
while len(tmpArray):
elem = tmpArray.pop(0)
tmpValue = value
cnt = 0
while tmpValue >= elem:
cnt += 1
tmpValue -= elem
subSolution = findSmallest(tmpValue, tmpArray)
if tmpValue == 0 or subSolution:
if not minSolution or len(subSolution) + cnt < len(minSolution):
minSolution = subSolution + [elem] * cnt
return minSolution
print findSmallest(10, array)
print findSmallest(50, array)
print findSmallest(49, array)
print findSmallest(55, array)
Prints:
[3, 3, 4]
[25, 25]
[3, 4, 4, 4, 4, 30]
[30, 25]
The invariant is that the function returns either the smallest set for the value passed in, or an empty set. It can then be used recursively with all possible values of the previous numbers in the list. Note that this is O(n!) in complexity, so it's going to be slow for large values. Also note that there are numerous optimization potentials here.
I made a small program to help with one solution. Personally, I believe the best would be a deterministic mathematical solution, but right now I lack the caffeine to even think on how to implement it. =)
Instead, I went with a SAR approach. Stop and Reverse is a technique used on stock trading (http://daytrading.about.com/od/stou/g/SAR.htm), and is heavily used to calculate optimal curves with a minimal of inference. The Wikipedia entry for parabolical SAR goes like this:
'The Parabolic SAR is calculated almost independently for each trend
in the price. When the price is in an uptrend, the SAR emerges below
the price and converges upwards towards it. Similarly, on a
downtrend, the SAR emerges above the price and converges
downwards.'
I adapted it to your problem. I start with a random value from your series. Then the code enters a finite number of iterations.
I pick another random value from the series stack.
If the new value plus the stack sum is inferior to the target, then the value is added; if superior, then decreased.
I can go on for as much as I want until I satisfy the condition (stack sum = target), or abort if the cycle can't find a valid solution.
If successful, I record the stack and the number of iterations. Then I redo everything.
An EXTREMELY crude code follows. Please forgive the hastiness. Oh, and It's in C#. =)
Again, It does not guarantee that you'll obtain the optimal path; it's a brute force approach. It can be refined; detect if there's a perfect match for a target hit, for example.
public static class SAR
{
//I'm considering Optimal as the smallest signature (number of members).
// Once set, all future signatures must be same or smaller.
private static Random _seed = new Random();
private static List<int> _domain = new List<int>() { 100, 80, 66, 24, 4, 2, 1 };
public static void SetDomain(string domain)
{
_domain = domain.Split(',').ToList<string>().ConvertAll<int>(a => Convert.ToInt32(a));
_domain.Sort();
}
public static void FindOptimalSAR(int value)
{
// I'll skip some obvious tests. For example:
// If there is no odd number in domain, then
// it's impossible to find a path to an odd
// value.
//Determining a max path run. If the count goes
// over this, it's useless to continue.
int _maxCycle = 10;
//Determining a maximum number of runs.
int _maxRun = 1000000;
int _run = 0;
int _domainCount = _domain.Count;
List<int> _currentOptimalSig = new List<int>();
List<String> _currentOptimalOps = new List<string>();
do
{
List<int> currSig = new List<int>();
List<string> currOps = new List<string>();
int _cycle = 0;
int _cycleTot = 0;
bool _OptimalFound = false;
do
{
int _cursor = _seed.Next(_domainCount);
currSig.Add(_cursor);
if (_cycleTot < value)
{
currOps.Add("+");
_cycleTot += _domain[_cursor];
}
else
{
// Your situation doesn't allow for negative
// numbers. Otherwise, just enable the two following lines.
// currOps.Add("-");
// _cycleTot -= _domain[_cursor];
}
if (_cycleTot == value)
{
_OptimalFound = true;
break;
}
_cycle++;
} while (_cycle < _maxCycle);
if (_OptimalFound)
{
_maxCycle = _cycle;
_currentOptimalOps = currOps;
_currentOptimalSig = currSig;
Console.Write("Optimal found: ");
for (int i = 0; i < currSig.Count; i++)
{
Console.Write(currOps[i]);
Console.Write(_domain[currSig[i]]);
}
Console.WriteLine(".");
}
_run++;
} while (_run < _maxRun);
}
}
And this is the caller:
String _Domain = "100, 80, 66, 25, 4, 2, 1";
SAR.SetDomain(_Domain);
Console.WriteLine("SAR for Domain {" + _Domain + "}");
do
{
Console.Write("Input target value: ");
int _parm = (Convert.ToInt32(Console.ReadLine()));
SAR.FindOptimalSAR(_parm);
Console.WriteLine("Done.");
} while (true);
This is my result after 100k iterations for a few targets, given a slightly modified series (I switched 25 for 24 for testing purposes):
SAR for Domain {100, 80, 66, 24, 4, 2, 1}
Input target value: 50
Optimal found: +24+24+2.
Done.
Input target value: 29
Optimal found: +4+1+24.
Done.
Input target value: 75
Optimal found: +2+2+1+66+4.
Optimal found: +4+66+4+1.
Done.
Now with your original series:
SAR for Domain {100, 80, 66, 25, 4, 2, 1}
Input target value: 50
Optimal found: +25+25.
Done.
Input target value: 75
Optimal found: +25+25+25.
Done.
Input target value: 512
Optimal found: +80+80+66+100+1+80+25+80.
Optimal found: +66+100+80+100+100+66.
Done.
Input target value: 1024
Optimal found: +100+1+80+80+100+2+100+2+2+2+25+2+100+66+25+66+100+80+25+66.
Optimal found: +4+25+100+80+100+1+80+1+100+4+2+1+100+1+100+100+100+25+100.
Optimal found: +80+80+25+1+100+66+80+80+80+100+25+66+66+4+100+4+1+66.
Optimal found: +1+100+100+100+2+66+25+100+66+100+80+4+100+80+100.
Optimal found: +66+100+100+100+100+100+100+100+66+66+25+1+100.
Optimal found: +100+66+80+66+100+66+80+66+100+100+100+100.
Done.
Cons: It is worth mentioning again: This algorithm does not guarantee that you will find the optimal values. It makes a brute-force approximation.
Pros: Fast. 100k iterations may initially seem a lot, but the algorithm starts ignoring long paths after it detects more and more optimized paths, since it lessens the maximum allowed number of cycles.
You are given an array of integers. You have to output the largest range so that all numbers in the range are present in the array. The numbers might be present in any order. For example, suppose that the array is
{2, 10, 3, 12, 5, 4, 11, 8, 7, 6, 15}
Here we find two (nontrivial) ranges for which all the integers in these ranges are present in the array, namely [2,8] and [10,12]. Out of these [2,8] is the longer one. So we need to output that.
When I was given this question, I was asked to do this in linear time and without using any sorting. I thought that there might be a hash-based solution, but I couldn't come up with anything.
Here's my attempt at a solution:
void printRange(int arr[])
{
int n=sizeof(arr)/sizeof(int);
int size=2;
int tempans[2];
int answer[2];// the range is stored in another array
for(int i =0;i<n;i++)
{
if(arr[0]<arr[1])
{
answer[0]=arr[0];
answer[1]=arr[1];
}
if(arr[1]<arr[0])
{
answer[0]=arr[1];
answer[1]=arr[0];
}
if(arr[i] < answer[1])
size += 1;
else if(arr[i]>answer[1]) {
initialize tempans to new range;
size2=2;
}
else {
initialize tempans to new range
}
}
//I have to check when the count becomes equal to the diff of the range
I am stuck at this part... I can't figure out how many tempanswer[] arrays should be used.
I think that the following solution will work in O(n) time using O(n) space.
Begin by putting all of the entries in the array into a hash table. Next, create a second hash table which stores elements that we have "visited," which is initially empty.
Now, iterate across the array of elements one at a time. For each element, check if the element is in the visited set. If so, skip it. Otherwise, count up from that element upward. At each step, check if the current number is in the main hash table. If so, continue onward and mark the current value as part of the visited set. If not, stop. Next, repeat this procedure, except counting downward. This tells us the number of contiguous elements in the range containing this particular array value. If we keep track of the largest range found this way, we will have a solution to our problem.
The runtime complexity of this algorithm is O(n). To see this, note that we can build the hash table in the first step in O(n) time. Next, when we begin scanning to array to find the largest range, each range scanned takes time proportional to the length of that range. Since the total sum of the lengths of the ranges is the number of elements in the original array, and since we never scan the same range twice (because we mark each number that we visit), this second step takes O(n) time as well, for a net runtime of O(n).
EDIT: If you're curious, I have a Java implementation of this algorithm, along with a much more detailed analysis of why it works and why it has the correct runtime. It also explores a few edge cases that aren't apparent in the initial description of the algorithm (for example, how to handle integer overflow).
Hope this helps!
The solution could use BitSet:
public static void detect(int []ns) {
BitSet bs = new BitSet();
for (int i = 0; i < ns.length; i++) {
bs.set(ns[i]);
}
int begin = 0;
int setpos = -1;
while((setpos = bs.nextSetBit(begin)) >= 0) {
begin = bs.nextClearBit(setpos);
System.out.print("[" + setpos + " , " + (begin - 1) + "]");
}
}
Sample I/O:
detect(new int[] {2,10, 3, 12, 5,4, 11, 8, 7, 6, 15} );
[2,8] [10,12] [15,15]
Here is the solution in Java:
public class Solution {
public int longestConsecutive(int[] num) {
int longest = 0;
Map<Integer, Boolean> map = new HashMap<Integer, Boolean>();
for(int i = 0; i< num.length; i++){
map.put(num[i], false);
}
int l, k;
for(int i = 0;i < num.length;i++){
if(map.containsKey(num[i]-1) || map.get(num[i])) continue;
map.put(num[i], true);
l = 0; k = num[i];
while (map.containsKey(k)){
l++;
k++;
}
if(longest < l) longest = l;
}
return longest;
}
}
Other approaches here.
The above answer by template will work but you don't need a hash table. Hashing could take a long time depending on what algorithm you use. You can ask the interviewer if there's a max number the integer can be, then create an array of that size. Call it exist[] Then scan through arr and mark exist[i] = 1; Then iterate through exist[] keeping track of 4 variables, size of current largest range, and the beginning of the current largest range, size of current range, and beginning of current range. When you see exist[i] = 0, compare the current range values vs largest range values and update the largest range values if needed.
If there's no max value then you might have to go with the hashing method.
Actually considering that we're only sorting integers and therefore a comparision sort is NOT necessary, you can just sort the array using a Radix- or BucketSort and then iterate through it.
Simple and certainly not what the interviewee wanted to hear, but correct nonetheless ;)
A Haskell implementation of Grigor Gevorgyan's solution, from another who didn't get a chance to post before the question was marked as a duplicate...(simply updates the hash and the longest range so far, while traversing the list)
import qualified Data.HashTable.IO as H
import Control.Monad.Random
f list = do
h <- H.new :: IO (H.BasicHashTable Int Int)
g list (0,[]) h where
g [] best h = return best
g (x:xs) best h = do
m <- H.lookup h x
case m of
Just _ -> g xs best h
otherwise -> do
(xValue,newRange) <- test
H.insert h x xValue
g xs (maximum [best,newRange]) h
where
test = do
m1 <- H.lookup h (x-1)
m2 <- H.lookup h (x+1)
case m1 of
Just x1 -> case m2 of
Just x2 -> do H.insert h (x-1) x2
H.insert h (x+1) x1
return (x,(x2 - x1 + 1,[x1,x2]))
Nothing -> do H.insert h (x-1) x
return (x1,(x - x1 + 1,[x,x1]))
Nothing -> case m2 of
Just x2 -> do H.insert h (x+1) x
return (x2,(x2 - x + 1,[x,x2]))
Nothing -> do return (x,(1,[x]))
rnd :: (RandomGen g) => Rand g Int
rnd = getRandomR (-100,100)
main = do
values <- evalRandIO (sequence (replicate (1000000) rnd))
f values >>= print
Output:
*Main> main
(10,[40,49])
(5.30 secs, 1132898932 bytes)
I read a lot of solutions on multiple platforms to this problem and one got my attention, as it solves the problem very elegantly and it is easy to follow.
The backbone of this method is to create a set/hash which takes O(n) time and from there every access to the set/hash will be O(1). As the O-Notation omit's constant terms, this Algorithm still can be described overall as O(n)
def longestConsecutive(self, nums):
nums = set(nums) # Create Hash O(1)
best = 0
for x in nums:
if x - 1 not in nums: # Optimization
y = x + 1 # Get possible next number
while y in nums: # If the next number is in set/hash
y += 1 # keep counting
best = max(best, y - x) # counting done, update best
return best
It's straight forward if you ran over it with simple numbers. The Optimization step is just a short-circuit to make sure you start counting, when that specific number is the beginning of a sequence.
All Credits to Stefan Pochmann.
Very short solution using Javascript sparse array feature:
O(n) time using O(n) additional space.
var arr = [2, 10, 3, 12, 5, 4, 11, 8, 7, 6, 15];
var a = [];
var count = 0, max_count = 0;
for (var i=0; i < arr.length; i++) a[arr[i]] = true;
for (i = 0; i < a.length; i++) {
count = (a[i]) ? count + 1 : 0;
max_count = Math.max(max_count, count);
}
console.log(max_count); // 7
A quick way to do it (PHP) :
$tab = array(14,12,1,5,7,3,4,10,11,8);
asort($tab);
$tab = array_values($tab);
$tab_contiguous = array();
$i=0;
foreach ($tab as $key => $val) {
$tab_contiguous[$i][] = $tab[$key];
if (isset($tab[$key+1])) {
if($tab[$key] + 1 != $tab[$key+1])
$i++;
}
}
echo(json_encode($tab_contiguous));