577
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This "sandbox" is a place where Code Golf users can get feedback on prospective challenges they wish to post to main. This is useful because writing a clear and fully specified challenge on your first try can be difficult, and there is a much better chance of your challenge being well received if you post it in the sandbox first.

Sandbox FAQ

Posting

To post to the sandbox, scroll to the bottom of this page and click "Answer This Question". Click "OK" when it asks if you really want to add another answer.

Write your challenge just as you would when actually posting it, though you can optionally add a title at the top. You may also add some notes about specific things you would like to clarify before posting it. Other users will help you improve your challenge by rating and discussing it.

When you think your challenge is ready for the public, go ahead and post it, and replace the post here with a link to the challenge and delete the sandbox post.

Discussion

The purpose of the sandbox is to give and receive feedback on posts. If you want to, feel free to give feedback to any posts you see here. Important things to comment about can include:

  • Parts of the challenge you found unclear
  • Comments addressing specific points mentioned in the proposal
  • Problems that could make the challenge uninteresting or unfit for the site

You don't need any qualifications to review sandbox posts. The target audience of most of these challenges is code golfers like you, so anything you find unclear will probably be unclear to others.

If you think one of your posts requires more feedback, but it's been ignored, you can ask for feedback in The Nineteenth Byte. It's not only allowed, but highly recommended! Be patient and try not to nag people though, you might have to ask multiple times.

It is recommended to leave your posts in the sandbox for at least several days, and until it receives upvotes and any feedback has been addressed.

Other

Search the sandbox / Browse your pending proposals

The sandbox works best if you sort posts by active.

To add an inline tag to a proposal, use shortcut link syntax with a prefix: [tag:king-of-the-hill]. To search for posts with a certain tag, include the name in quotes: "king-of-the-hill".

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2
  • \$\begingroup\$ What if I posted on the sandbox a long time ago and get no response? \$\endgroup\$
    – None1
    Commented May 15 at 14:05
  • \$\begingroup\$ @None1 If you don't get feedback for a while you can ask in the nineteenth byte \$\endgroup\$ Commented May 29 at 13:27

4831 Answers 4831

1
41 42
43
44 45
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2
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How long will my microwave run for?

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4
  • \$\begingroup\$ I'd recommend getting rid of the bonuses, they're pretty strongly discouraged \$\endgroup\$
    – rydwolf
    Commented Dec 3, 2021 at 17:32
  • \$\begingroup\$ @RedwolfPrograms I do like the bonus challenge, however I'm not sure what to do with it. \$\endgroup\$
    – Ginger
    Commented Dec 3, 2021 at 17:33
  • 1
    \$\begingroup\$ You could just turn the bonus challenge into a separate question \$\endgroup\$
    – pxeger
    Commented Dec 3, 2021 at 17:41
  • \$\begingroup\$ @pxeger I'll make it a seperate question and post it later. \$\endgroup\$
    – Ginger
    Commented Dec 3, 2021 at 17:49
2
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Subdivide the Bezier Curve

Background

A Bezier curve is a type of curve that has a lot of applications in all sorts of places, but most commonly, in computer graphics. It has a very simple algorithm and yet can represent a wide variety of shapes with just one common formula. If you've ever used pen tools in drawing software, you're probably already familiar with the general idea behind Bezier curves.

Given an ordered list of control points, we set some parameter \$t\$ in the range \$[0, 1]\$. Then, for each \$t\$, we draw a line between each consecutive pair of control points and select a point that is \$t\$ from the starting point. For example, if we have three control points and \$t\$ is \$\frac13\$:

enter image description here

The purple point is \$\frac13\$ of the way from the red point to the blue point, and the black point is \$\frac13\$ of the way from the blue point to the green point. You can change the ratio and move the points around here to try it out.

Now, we have one fewer point than we initially had control points. Let these be the new control points, and do this again with the same \$t\$:

enter image description here

(Desmos link). Now, we finally have a single point, so that is the point we obtain for this value of our parameter \$t\$. The Bezier curve is obtained from all final points for each \$0\leq t\leq 1\$. For more points, we just repeat this for more steps. Here's what a Bezier curve with four control points looks like:

enter image description here

(Desmos link)

Challenge

Given a list of control points for a Bezier curve and a positive integer \$n\$, subdivide the Bezier curve into \$n\$ segments and return the points. More precisely, return the output points for \$t=0,\frac1n,\frac2n,\cdots,\frac{n-1}n,1\$.

You may do I/O in any reasonable format; for example, a list of pairs or a pair of x and y coordinates for input, and a pair of numbers for output. Floating point errors are acceptable but your outputs should have an accuracy of at least \$10^{-3}\$ relative or absolute, whichever is larger.

There will be at least one point and \$n\$ will be a positive integer.

Example

Given input \$\{(0,0),(1,3),(4,2),(5,1)\}\$ and \$3\$ subdivisions:

For \$t=0\$, we just have \$(0,0)\$, and for \$t=1\$ we just have \$(5,1)\$.

For \$t=\frac13\$, we first go \$\frac13\$ of the way from each control point to the next to get \$\{(\frac13,1),(2,\frac83),(\frac{13}3,\frac53)\}\$. Repeating that once more gives us \$\{(\frac89,\frac{14}9),(\frac{25}9,\frac73)\}\$. Finally, if we do it once more, we get the single point \$(\frac{41}{27},\frac{49}{27})\$.

For \$t=\frac23\$, we first get \$\{(\frac23,2),(3,\frac73),(\frac{14}3,\frac43)\}\$, then \$\{(\frac{20}9,\frac{20}9),(\frac{37}9,\frac53)\}\$, and finally, \$(\frac{94}{27},\frac{50}{27})\$. And just for a sanity check, the points are indeed on the curve:

enter image description here

Note that these points do not evenly subdivide the Bezier curve by arclength. The arclength of a Bezier curve actually cannot be calculated exactly and subdividing like that would have to be done via approximations.

Test case generator

Credit to Wezl for the original idea.

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2
  • \$\begingroup\$ love the interactive parts \$\endgroup\$
    – Wezl
    Commented Dec 18, 2021 at 17:28
  • \$\begingroup\$ When reading this I didn't expect it to be you having posted it lol \$\endgroup\$
    – emanresu A
    Commented Dec 23, 2021 at 7:55
2
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Demonstrate some easier abstract algebra

From my related challenge, Demonstrate some advanced abstract algebra

Consider a binary operator \$*\$ that operates on a set \$S\$. For simplicity's sake, we'll assume that \$*\$ is closed, meaning that its inputs and outputs are always members of \$S\$.

Let's define some basic terms describing the properties of \$*\$. We can say that \$*\$ can have any of these properties, if they hold for all \$a,b,c \in S\$:

  • Commutative: \$a*b = b*a\$
  • Associative: \$(a*b)*c = a*(b*c)\$
  • Distributive: \$a*(b+c) = (a*b)+(a*c)\$, for some binary operator \$+\$ on \$S\$

We can also define 3 related properties, for a unary operation \$-\$ on \$S\$:

  • Anti-commutative: \$a*b = -(b*a)\$
  • Anti-associative: \$(a*b)*c = -(a*(b*c))\$
  • Anti-distributive: \$a*(b+c) = -((a*b)+(a*c))\$

Finally, we define 3 more, that only describe \$*\$ if the complete statement is true for \$a,b,c \in S\$:

  • Non-commutative: There exists \$a, b\$ such that \$a*b \ne b*a\$ and \$a*b \ne -(b*a)\$
  • Non-associative: There exists \$a, b, c\$ such that \$(a*b)*c \ne a*(b*c)\$ and \$(a*b)*c \neq -(a*(b*c))\$
  • Non-distributive: These exists \$a,b,c\$ such that \$a*(b+c) \ne (a*b)+(a*c)\$ and \$a*(b+c) \ne -((a*b)+(a*c))\$

We now have 9 distinct properties a binary operator can have: commutativity, non-commutativity, anti-commutativity, associativity, non-associativity, anti-associativity, distributivity, non-distributivity and anti-distributivity.

This does require two operators (\$-\$ and \$+\$) to be defined on \$S\$ as well. For this challenge we'll use standard integer negation and addition for these two, and will be using \$S = \mathbb Z\$.

Obviously, any given binary operator can only meet a maximum of 3 of these 9 properties, as it cannot be e.g. both non-associative and anti-associative.


Let's create a "table" of these properties:

Commutative Associative Distributive
Regular Commutative Associative Distributive
Anti Anti-commutative Anti-associative Anti-distributive
Non Non-Commutative Non-associative Non-distributive

Your task is to write 3 programs (either full programs or functions. You may "mix and match" if you wish).

Each of these 3 programs will:

  • take two integers, in any reasonable format and method

  • output one integer, in the same format as the input and in any reasonable method

  • be non-constant. That is, there exists at least two distinct inputs that have distinct outputs.

  • have exactly 3 of the 9 above properties. However, those three properties muse be in different rows and columns in the above table from each other. This means that it can be (for example) commutative, non-associative, anti-distributive; non-commutative, anti-associative, distributive; or anti-commutative, associative, non-distributive. But, it cannot be (for example) commutative, associative, distributive; non-commutative, non-associative, non-distributive; or non-commutative, anti-distributive, anti-associative.

This is ; the combined lengths of all 3 of your programs is your score, and you should aim to minimise this.

Additionally, you should include some form of proof that your programs do indeed have the required properties and do not satisfy the other properties. Answers without these are not considered valid.

Alternatively, a proof of impossibility is a valid answer. If you can demonstrate that there are no such programs that satisfy the criteria listed above, then this proof constitutes a valid answer as well.


Meta

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5
  • \$\begingroup\$ There exists no anti-distributive surjection when \$S=\mathbb Z\$. Maybe there exists one when \$S=(\mathbb Z/2\mathbb Z)^k\$, but I haven't found one yet. \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jun 16, 2021 at 9:12
  • \$\begingroup\$ I would remove the constraint that the operator be a surjection, and just impose that it be non-constant. If you convince yourself that such an anti-distributive operator exists, you could post the challenge, but I would change it to "write 3-9 programs, such that each property is verified by (at least) one program". That would be an incentive to have programs which verify several properties at once, but make it more manageable. \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jun 16, 2021 at 9:18
  • \$\begingroup\$ Also, there are problems with your "anti-associativity": if b = 1, then (a*b)*c = a*(b*c). \$\endgroup\$
    – anatolyg
    Commented Jun 16, 2021 at 10:43
  • \$\begingroup\$ @RobinRyder If \$ S=(\mathbb Z / 2\mathbb Z)^k\$, aren't anti-distributive operators the same as distributive operators? \$\endgroup\$
    – Nitrodon
    Commented Jun 16, 2021 at 14:21
  • \$\begingroup\$ @Nitrodon Yes, of course you are right. \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jun 16, 2021 at 15:03
2
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Twins' complements

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2
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Code Golf Birthday Cake

Your task is to print this exact text:

     0 2 4 6 8 10
     | | | | | |
    &***********&
    | Code Golf |
   | e---------f |
  | d___________l |
 | o-------------o |
| C_______________G |
 ###Dennis$Dennis###
#####################

Rules

  • Trailing or leading newline is allowed
  • , so shortest code wins!

Meta

  • Any feedback?
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9
  • \$\begingroup\$ why is it lopsided \$\endgroup\$ Commented Dec 21, 2021 at 15:56
  • \$\begingroup\$ @thejonymyster fixed? \$\endgroup\$ Commented Dec 21, 2021 at 15:57
  • \$\begingroup\$ No, that's more lopsided. You only need one $ between the Dennises, if that helps. \$\endgroup\$ Commented Dec 21, 2021 at 16:00
  • \$\begingroup\$ @thejonymyster fixed? \$\endgroup\$ Commented Dec 21, 2021 at 16:18
  • \$\begingroup\$ Well now the bottom is asymmetric, but also what do the numbers mean? \$\endgroup\$ Commented Dec 21, 2021 at 17:16
  • \$\begingroup\$ @thejonymyster the site is about 9 years old \$\endgroup\$ Commented Dec 21, 2021 at 18:27
  • 1
    \$\begingroup\$ Are you sure you want the bottom line have an extra # on left side but no such # on right side? \$\endgroup\$
    – tsh
    Commented Dec 24, 2021 at 5:30
  • \$\begingroup\$ @tsh fixed now? \$\endgroup\$ Commented Dec 24, 2021 at 11:53
  • \$\begingroup\$ can you add more candles? \$\endgroup\$
    – Fmbalbuena
    Commented Dec 27, 2021 at 16:06
2
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Domino tilings in an N-dimensional cube

Challenge

Imagine an N-dimensional cube which has dimensions 2×2×...×2. Given the value of N (a positive integer), calculate the number of ways it can be divided into 2×1×1×...×1 "hyper-domino" pieces (two unit N-dimensional hypercubes glued together).

Standard rules apply. The shortest code in bytes wins.

Examples and test cases

For N = 1, the "cube" is a single domino. A single domino can be divided into a single domino in exactly one way, so the answer is 1.

For N = 2, the "cube" is a 2×2 square. It can be divided, or tiled, in two ways:

--  ||
--  ||

For N = 3, the cube is a 2×2×2 cube. It can be divided into four domino-cubes in nine different ways. One way to count it is to see that, if you pick a unit cube, it can be used by three different domino-cubes (one in each direction), and in all cases the rest forms a small staircase-like shape

L1  L2
#   #
##  ##

which can be divided into three pieces in three ways (# denotes a piece in Z-direction)

#   #
--  --

#   #
##  ##

|   |
|#  |#

which gives 3×3 = 9.

The corresponding sequence is A005271.

N    Answer
-----------
1    1
2    2
3    9
4    272
5    589185
6    16332454526976
7    391689748492473664721077609089
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2
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Number of complete rhyme schemes

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2
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Is it a perfect word?

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1
  • \$\begingroup\$ @mathcat "The word may always be assumed to be lowercase." \$\endgroup\$
    – Ginger
    Commented Jan 14, 2022 at 19:31
2
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Number of arrangements of half a Rubik's cube

From a corner-on view of a Rubik's cube calculate the number of arrangements of stickers that are out of view.

Your input will provide the state of a Rubik's cube when viewed like the below image:

enter image description here

This input will be an array, in any defined order†, grouping†, and nesting† that you choose, containing the colours‡ of the \$27\$stickers (A.K.A. facelets or tiles) on three sides of a 3x3 Rubik's cube that join at one corner, like you can see above.

The input may be assumed to be that of a solvable state where only face turns can return the cube to having six sides with a single colour on each (if it isn't then your code may do anything, short of summoning Cthulhu).

† The input may be a flat list of colour-labels or you may specify that these labels will already be grouped in any way you wish (it may be a ragged, nested list for example), but the content thereof should only consist of the sticker colour-labels.

‡ Since the centres of the cube are actually fixed relative to each other, and hence the hidden centres' colours are known, you may choose to leave any or all of the central stickers out of the expected input (it could be as short as \$24\$ sticker colour-labels) while using a labeling that identifes the colours as the top-centre, left-centre, right-centre, and their three opposite colours. For the record, the standard colour theme, as in the image above, has orange opposite red, white opposite yellow, and green opposite blue (hence orange is the hidden centre sticker on the bottom etc.).

You should output the number of possible arrangements of sticker colours of the \$27\$ stickers which are not in the input (i.e. those stickers which are out of view). Note that swapping two of those stickers of the same colour is considered to be the same arrangement.


Sandbox questions

  1. Does this need test cases? (I'm not even 100% sure what the output should be if the input looked like a solved cube from that perspective although I may be able to work it out without writing a program it's certainly more than one - e.g. U' L R2 D' M D2 M' D' L' R2 U or R2 U R2 F2 R2 U2 F2 R2 F2 U R2)

  2. Is the spec clear?

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1
  • \$\begingroup\$ You should probably make it more explicit that the center colors of the opposite faces are known. (Also, I'm fairly sure that a "solved cube" input would have an output of 192, but that's just me doing quick math in my head, so I could be wrong.) \$\endgroup\$
    – Nitrodon
    Commented Jan 14, 2022 at 15:18
2
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Solve nonimplication-SAT

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1
  • \$\begingroup\$ I don't think there is really one set of "standard decision-problem rules" (as there are for sequence); you could just say something like "output using any two distinct values representing true and false" \$\endgroup\$
    – pxeger
    Commented Dec 31, 2021 at 23:26
2
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Is this continuous terrain?

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5
  • \$\begingroup\$ [Suggested Testcase](Try it online!) \$\endgroup\$
    – Fmbalbuena
    Commented Jan 10, 2022 at 0:23
  • \$\begingroup\$ I am unsure if you should allow both ~ and -. Can one even freely mix them? \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jan 10, 2022 at 12:33
  • \$\begingroup\$ @JonathanFrech as in you can choose to take input with overlines replaced with one of them \$\endgroup\$
    – emanresu A
    Commented Jan 11, 2022 at 8:39
  • \$\begingroup\$ question name idea: "is this continuous terrain?" I have a feeling there is a dupe of this. \$\endgroup\$
    – Razetime
    Commented Jan 14, 2022 at 4:05
  • \$\begingroup\$ @Razetime Good idea! \$\endgroup\$
    – emanresu A
    Commented Jan 14, 2022 at 8:25
2
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Sides of a polygon

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5
  • \$\begingroup\$ Will the shape touch itself? Say, like this or this ? \$\endgroup\$
    – tsh
    Commented Dec 27, 2021 at 5:40
  • \$\begingroup\$ @tsh No,it won't. \$\endgroup\$
    – emanresu A
    Commented Dec 27, 2021 at 5:56
  • \$\begingroup\$ By your current examples, this is a valid shape although it looks very strange. \$\endgroup\$
    – tsh
    Commented Dec 29, 2021 at 7:15
  • \$\begingroup\$ @tsh Yeah, I’ll just leave that since allowing those shapes doesn’t car assist any problems or ambiguousities. \$\endgroup\$
    – emanresu A
    Commented Dec 29, 2021 at 8:18
  • \$\begingroup\$ I would like for the valid inputs to be more clearly defined. How many sides does @ths's "very strange" looking shape have? \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jan 10, 2022 at 12:52
2
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BCD to binary, with bitwise


In this challenge, you'll convert an 8-digit BCD (Binary Coded Decimal) number to a 32 bit (unsigned) integer in the fewest instructions possible, with only bitwise instructions available.

Task:

You'll be given a single positive integer as input, from 00000000 to 999999999. It will be represented using BCD, as a 4-byte unsigned integer, with each nibble being a decimal digit from 0000 (0) to 1010 (10). More significant nibbles will correspond to more significant digits of the decimal number.

Your output should be that same number, as an ordinary 32-bit integer.

Instructions:

This is atomic code golf, so you can only use the following instructions, the number of which is used for scoring:

and [r], [r|I]      Bitwise AND
or  [r], [r|I]      Bitwise OR
xor [r], [r|I]      Bitwise XOR

not [r]             Bitwise NOT

shr [r], [r|I]      Shift right (zero fill)
shl [r], [r|I]      Shift left

mov [r], [r|I]      Copy

All instructions will write their output to the first register listed, and for the second argument [r|I] indicates either a register or an immediate (any 32-bit constant) can be provided.

You have four registers to work with, all of which hold a single 4 byte unsigned integer: ra, rb, rc, and rd. Any instruction using only registers costs 1 byte, and any with an immediate cost a total of 4 (this isn't technically possible, since the immediates are 4 bytes on their own, but I don't want to make them too costly).

Input will be provided in ra, and the contents of ra when your program is finished will be used as output. All other registers will be initialized to 0.

Instructions Mk. 2:

This is atomic code golf, so you can only use the following instructions, the number of which is used for scoring:

and [r], [r|I]      Bitwise AND
or  [r], [r|I]      Bitwise OR
xor [r], [r|I]      Bitwise XOR

not [r]             Bitwise NOT

shr [r], [r|I]      Shift right (zero fill)
shl [r], [r|I]      Shift left

mov [r], [r|I]      Copy

goto [r|I]          Go to an instruction (`0` is the start of the program)
goif [r] [r|I]      Go to an instruction, if `r` is not all `0`s

All instructions (aside from goto and goif) will write their output to the first register listed, and for the second argument [r|I] indicates either a register or an immediate (any 32-bit constant) can be provided.

You have 8 registers to work with, all of which hold a single 4 byte unsigned integer: ra, rb, rc, rd, rk, rn, rp, and rs. Any instruction using only registers costs 1 score, and any with an immediate cost a total of 2.

Input will be provided in ra, and the contents of ra when your program is finished will be used as output. All other registers will be initialized to 0.

Other:

I don't actually know if this is an interesting challenge, or if more registers will be needed, or if there's already a well known solution. I'd try it myself but it's kinda late here so I'm too tired to, and if I don't post this now I'll forget about it lol

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1
  • \$\begingroup\$ Maybe just give infinite amount of registers and don't call them "byte" but "score"? \$\endgroup\$
    – l4m2
    Commented Jan 18, 2022 at 12:29
2
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Compress and decompress

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4
  • \$\begingroup\$ self-referential might be better than quine. But are you assuming normal quine rules? Are programs allowed to introspect their own source code? \$\endgroup\$
    – pxeger
    Commented Jan 17, 2022 at 10:15
  • \$\begingroup\$ This challenge is fairly similar to Encode a Lenguage, but I think it's sufficiently open-ended that it's different in an interesting way. \$\endgroup\$
    – pxeger
    Commented Jan 17, 2022 at 10:18
  • \$\begingroup\$ Personally I think this would be more interesting if you were allowed to read your source code, because otherwise it becomes too much of a quine variant where most of the code is taken up by encoding the program's source code, and not the interesting task (which is the compression). (Sorry, I probably should have given you this opinion before I asked you to decide whether quine rules applied) \$\endgroup\$
    – pxeger
    Commented Jan 17, 2022 at 10:26
  • 1
    \$\begingroup\$ @pxeger I added the quine rules specifically to discourage solutions where you just swap your programs source code and a single input. The other (more interesting imo.) approach is to actually do compression and then make your source code compressible. \$\endgroup\$
    – AnttiP
    Commented Jan 17, 2022 at 10:32
2
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Prime Number Fibonacci

In this challenge, you will make a program that calculates the Fibonacci sequence with a twist. Instead of it starting with 0 and 1, it starts with the nth prime number determined by input by the user. The second number is the nth+1 prime number. The sequence should also stop after nth number iterations.

Walkthrough:

  1. Get a number from the input. We will call it n
  2. Calculate the n prime number and n+1 prime number
  3. Make a function that adds these numbers and calls itself with the result.
  4. Make the function stop once prime number with index n numbers are output

Examples:

input:2
output:
8
13
21
34
55

input:10
output:
60
91
151
242
393
635
1028
1663
2691
4354
7045
11399
18444
29843
48287
78130
126417
204547
330964
535511
866475
1401986
2268461
3670447
5938908
9609355
15548263
25157618
40705881
65863499
106569380

input:5
output:
24
37
61
98
159
257
416
673
1089
1762
2851
4613
7464

By the way, here is the JavaScript code I used for this example:

var primeNumber1 = prime(num);
var primeNumber2 = prime(num+1);
fib(primeNumber1,primeNumber2,0,primeNumber1);
}
function fib(num1,num2,iterations,max){
console.log(num1+num2);
if(iterations == max+1){
return;
}
fib(num2,num1+num2,iterations+1,max);
}
function prime(number){
var numPrime = 0;
for(var i = 0; i > -1; i++){
if(isPrime(i)){
numPrime++;
if(numPrime == number){
return i;
}
}
}
}
function isPrime(num) {
  for(var i = 2; i < num; i++)
    if(num % i === 0) return false;
  return num > 1;
}
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4
  • \$\begingroup\$ I would define the task more clearly. Something along the lines of (if I understood correctly) "Let \$(p_k)_{k\geq 1}\$ denote the ordered sequence of all prime numbers. Given a natural number \$n\geq 1\$, output \$(a_1,\dots,a_{p_n+p_{n+1}})\$ where \$a_{-1}:=p_n\$, \$a_0:=p_{n+1}\$ and \$a_k:=a_{k-2}+a_{k-1}\$ for \$k\geq 1\$." \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jan 19, 2022 at 9:28
  • \$\begingroup\$ @JonathanFrech I have no idea what those symbols mean except for greater than and I know := is used in statically typed programming language to infer the type of a variable. Could you explain what the math string means and how it would clarify my question? \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jan 19, 2022 at 14:12
  • \$\begingroup\$ When you say "the nth prime number", is for you 2 the prime number with index \$0\$ or \$1\$? I guess the latter, so \$p_1=2\$. Then I understand your task to be printing \$p_n\$ integers which are defined as follows: the first number to be printed is \$a_1=p_n+p_{n+1}\$, the second is \$a_2=p_{n+1}+a_1\$, the third \$a_3=a_1+a_2\$ and so on up to \$a_{p_n+p_{n+1}}\$. I found it hard to read into your explanation and would like a more clear definition of the task -- be it with formulae or word descriptions. \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jan 20, 2022 at 19:21
  • \$\begingroup\$ I guess my problem is that I have to infer from your example that the 2nd prime number is 3 and "Make a function that adds these numbers and calls itself with the result." requires thinking of Fibonacci to properly interpret. \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jan 20, 2022 at 19:23
2
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Mat Printing Matrix

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5
  • \$\begingroup\$ er wats default I/O @adam \$\endgroup\$
    – DialFrost
    Commented Jan 17, 2022 at 11:56
  • \$\begingroup\$ im sorry i dont understand @adam could u explain the defualt IO (i alr read the link doesnt rly help) or edit my post thx \$\endgroup\$
    – DialFrost
    Commented Jan 17, 2022 at 12:02
  • \$\begingroup\$ like this? i changed it \$\endgroup\$
    – DialFrost
    Commented Jan 17, 2022 at 12:08
  • \$\begingroup\$ Yeah, this looks great. Maybe put in the tags you plan on using. \$\endgroup\$
    – Adám
    Commented Jan 17, 2022 at 12:55
  • \$\begingroup\$ @adam pls edit the tags if its wrong thx \$\endgroup\$
    – DialFrost
    Commented Jan 17, 2022 at 13:24
2
\$\begingroup\$

Implement an argwhere function

Posted

\$\endgroup\$
2
  • \$\begingroup\$ Interesting. I'm guessing "no", but are langs without function definition allowed to participate? \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jan 14, 2022 at 19:53
  • \$\begingroup\$ @thejonymyster I'm not too interested in making restrictions. If your language can accept code as input and run it to make decisions, I'd say that's good enough. But as with all functional-programming questions, some languages will inevitably be excluded. \$\endgroup\$
    – chunes
    Commented Jan 15, 2022 at 5:47
2
\$\begingroup\$

Is this word in standard order?

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6
  • \$\begingroup\$ IMO this would be better as an array challenge with arrays of [1,2,3] etc. \$\endgroup\$
    – emanresu A
    Commented Dec 31, 2021 at 22:07
  • \$\begingroup\$ @emanresuA I considered that, but I thought using letters might create some interesting solutions using regular expressions and what-not. Do you think I should allow working over any set (e.g. the natural numbers), not just the alphabet? Or would that be too complex? \$\endgroup\$
    – pxeger
    Commented Dec 31, 2021 at 22:14
  • \$\begingroup\$ And "some \$x\$"? \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jan 10, 2022 at 12:35
  • \$\begingroup\$ @JonathanFrech What do you mean? \$\endgroup\$
    – pxeger
    Commented Jan 18, 2022 at 8:28
  • \$\begingroup\$ @pxeger I edited in what I meant; feel free to revert. \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jan 19, 2022 at 9:16
  • 1
    \$\begingroup\$ I thought on first looks that this is the same as Stackable sequences, but this allows things like aabcc, which I think would be a good test case. Perhaps another useful characterization is that if we take the first appearance of each letter, the resulting sequence counts up from a without gaps. \$\endgroup\$
    – xnor
    Commented Jan 19, 2022 at 11:57
2
\$\begingroup\$

Move to Right and left

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2
  • \$\begingroup\$ why are there X crossings? wouldn't they just combine right there? \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jan 20, 2022 at 15:42
  • \$\begingroup\$ @thejonymyster this is cross. \$\endgroup\$
    – Fmbalbuena
    Commented Jan 20, 2022 at 17:35
2
\$\begingroup\$

Crack the Caesar cipher

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2
  • \$\begingroup\$ Can we not have to deal with capitalisation? \$\endgroup\$
    – emanresu A
    Commented Jan 18, 2022 at 21:08
  • \$\begingroup\$ I've edited this down to a stub now that it's been posted to save space \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jan 21, 2022 at 21:59
2
\$\begingroup\$

Regex ordinals

Inspired by this xkcd comic, your job is to write an extremely meta regex.

Specifically, the depth of a regex is an ordinal defined as follows:

  1. regex golf has depth 0.
  2. meta-x has depth 1 greater than the depth of x.
  3. The depth of <regex> is the supremum of the depths of everything <regex> matches.

Of course, it's possible for a string not to have a depth. For example, /.*/ matches itself, so its depth would have to be greater than its depth, which is impossible.

Your challenge is to write a regex with depth \$\omega^2\$.

And this is code golf, so the shortest regex wins.

Examples of regex ordinals

  • meta-regex golf is depth 1.
  • meta-meta-regex golf is depth 2.
  • /(meta-)*regex golf/ is depth \$\omega\$.
  • /(meta-)*\/(meta-)\*regex golf\// is depth \$\omega 2\$.
\$\endgroup\$
1
2
\$\begingroup\$

Von Neumann Probe Battle ()


This is just an idea for now, placing it here as a draft and to collect feedback.

Basically, your goal would be to design a set of machines, including factories and spacecraft, which start on earth and spread outward into the universe. You'd be able to design these machines. Not just their code, but the parts that make them up.

For example, you could start on earth with a single factory, which would make a swarm of mining bots. These would bring ore to the surface, and the factory would switch to making spacecraft. Once the spacecraft are built, the factory could assemble all of the parts needed to make an identical factory, load them onto the spacecraft, and send them to the moon. Then, both factories would start the process over.

The ultimate goal would be to build "stamps", which cost a small amount of iron, and then vanish from existence. These are used for scoring.

This challenge might not be very practical, due to the issues involved in simulating a detailed and exponentially increasing swarm of robots in a vast universe.

\$\endgroup\$
2
  • \$\begingroup\$ stamps? you mean paperclips \$\endgroup\$
    – Ginger
    Commented Jan 22, 2022 at 22:05
  • \$\begingroup\$ @GingerIndustries Maybe :p \$\endgroup\$
    – rydwolf
    Commented Jan 22, 2022 at 22:06
2
\$\begingroup\$

Pretty print my arrays

I like to pretty print multidimensional arrays, like this:

[ [ [1, 2, 3],
    [4, 5, 6] ],
  [ [7, 8, 9],
    [6, 4, 2] ] ]

But it's a pain to do by hand and it'd be nice to have a program that does this for me. Your challenge is to create a program that does this for me, taking a multidimensional array containing only numbers and prettyprinting it.

Specifically, an array of depth 1 is printed joined by , with [ prepended and ] appended:

[1, 2, 3]

An array of depth \$n+1\$, which contains at least one array of depth \$n\$, has its subarrays prettyprinted, joined by newlines and indented by two spaces. All but the last subarray have a comma appended, the last has ] appended, and the first has its first line indented with [ instead of two spaces:

enter image description here

Here's a reference implementation:

function recursivePrettyPrint(array){
  if(array.every(x => typeof x == "number")){
    return `[${array.join(', ')}]`;
  } else {
    return array.map((item, index) => {
      let result = recursivePrettyPrint(item) + ',';
      result = result.split`\n`;
      if(index == 0){
        result[0] = '[ ' + result[0];
      } else {
        result[0] = '  ' + result[0];
      }
      for(let i = 1; i < result.length; i++){
        result[i] = '  ' + result[i]
      }
      return result.join('\n');
    }).join('\n').slice(0,-1) + ' ]';
  }
}

function change(){
  let array = JSON.parse(document.getElementById('input').value);
  let output = document.getElementById('output');
  output.innerText = recursivePrettyPrint(array);
}
<textarea id=input></textarea>

<button id=run onclick=change()>Pretty Print</button>

<pre id=output></pre>

Numbers may be multiple digits. The input will always be orthogonal/rectangular, and you may take its dimensions as well.

Testcases

[[892, 759], [962, 251]] ->
[ [892, 759],
  [962, 251] ]

[118, 922, 619] ->
[118, 922, 619]

[[966, 639, 616, 255], [622, 483, 87, 241], [453, 870, 728, 725], [163, 936, 48, 967], [261, 833, 87, 200]] -> 
[ [966, 639, 616, 255],
  [622, 483, 87, 241],
  [453, 870, 728, 725],
  [163, 936, 48, 967],
  [261, 833, 87, 200] ]

[[[[[912, 547], [366, 754]], [[723, 536], [779, 238]]], [[[559, 392], [602, 709]], [[692, 915], [412, 302]]]], [[[[3, 504], [936, 83]], [[352, 442], [425, 375]]], [[[380, 440], [793, 762]], [[850, 321], [780, 457]]]]] ->
[ [ [ [ [912, 547],
        [366, 754] ],
      [ [723, 536],
        [779, 238] ] ],
    [ [ [559, 392],
        [602, 709] ],
      [ [692, 915],
        [412, 302] ] ] ],
  [ [ [ [3, 504],
        [936, 83] ],
      [ [352, 442],
        [425, 375] ] ],
    [ [ [380, 440],
        [793, 762] ],
      [ [850, 321],
        [780, 457] ] ] ] ]

[[[128, 910, 664, 658], [172, 238, 564, 492], [325, 384, 566, 90]], [[876, 819, 764, 105], [583, 528, 731, 839], [480, 126, 692, 875]], [[215, 84, 268, 504], [400, 674, 997, 526], [799, 692, 193, 296]], [[943, 185, 567, 188], [118, 200, 879, 409], [116, 493, 62, 343]]] -> 
[ [ [128, 910, 664, 658],
    [172, 238, 564, 492],
    [325, 384, 566, 90] ],
  [ [876, 819, 764, 105],
    [583, 528, 731, 839],
    [480, 126, 692, 875] ],
  [ [215, 84, 268, 504],
    [400, 674, 997, 526],
    [799, 692, 193, 296] ],
  [ [943, 185, 567, 188],
    [118, 200, 879, 409],
    [116, 493, 62, 343] ] ]
```
\$\endgroup\$
3
  • \$\begingroup\$ "Numbers may be multiple digits" but you should state that numbers will be the only atomic data to occur. \$\endgroup\$
    – Adám
    Commented Jan 24, 2022 at 23:40
  • 2
    \$\begingroup\$ Fine challenge, but I hate this way of printing arrays :P \$\endgroup\$
    – Wheat Wizard Mod
    Commented Jan 24, 2022 at 23:46
  • \$\begingroup\$ May I input the array as a string? If so, what formatting may I assume for the input array? For example, will there always be a space after each comma? \$\endgroup\$
    – tsh
    Commented Jan 27, 2022 at 8:16
2
\$\begingroup\$

Trap the hero in a maze

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2
\$\begingroup\$

Ragged list addition

Let's define the operator \$+\$ as follows, using wrapping list indexing:

\$ a+b=\begin{cases} a+b,\space\text{if }a\text{ and }b\text{ are integers (regular integer addition)}\\ [a+b[0], a+b[1], ...,a+b[len(b)-1]],\text{if }a\text{ is an integer and }b\text{ is a list}\\ [a[0]+b,a[1]+b,...,a[len(a)-1]+b],\text{if }b\text{ is a list and }\text{ is an integer}\\ [a[0]+b[0], a[1]+b[1], a[2]+b[2],...,\\a[\max(len(a),len(b))-1]+b[\max(len(a),len(b))-1]],\text{if }a\text{ and }b\text{ are lists} \end{cases} \$

That is huge wall of text, so let's look at an example: We want to add the arrays \$[1,2,[5,6,7]]\$ and \$[[1],2,3,10,0,[3,0],1]\$ together

Let's start

\$[1,2,[5,6,7]]+[[1],2,3,10,0,[3,0],1]\$

We are adding two arrays, so we add element by element, looping if neccesary:

\$[1+[1],2+2,[5,6,7]+3,1+10,2+0,[5,6,7]+[3,0],1+1]\$

Now, let's get all the additions that don't involve lists out of the way

\$[1+[1],4,[5,6,7]+3,11,2,[5,6,7]+[3,0],2]\$

Next, lets look at \$1+[1]\$ and \$[5,6,7]+3\$. Here we add an integer to an array, so we just distribute the addition like so:

\$[[1+1],4,[5+3,6+3,7+3],11,2,[5,6,7]+[3,0],2]\$

\$[[2],4,[8,9,10],11,2,[5,6,7]+[3,0],2]\$

Now we have \$[5,6,7]+[3,0]\$ left. Again, we interleave the arrays, looping if necessary:

\$[[2],4,[8,9,10],11,2,[5+3,6+0,7+3],2]\$

\$[[2],4,[8,9,10],11,2,[8,6,10],2]\$

Now there are no \$+\$ signs left. Thus \$[1,2,[5,6,7]]+[[1],2,3,10,0,[3,0],1]=[[2],4,[8,9,10],11,2,[8,6,10],2]\$

Note that ragged list addition is not commutative. So \$a+b\$ is not necessarily the same as \$b+a\$.

Your code takes two ragged lists and returns their sum. Shortest code wins.

\$\endgroup\$
2
\$\begingroup\$

Animate finding the middle (hypercube edition)

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5
  • \$\begingroup\$ "All dimensions are the same" should probably be worded more like; "All dimensions are the same length". \$\endgroup\$
    – ATaco
    Commented Jan 20, 2022 at 6:33
  • \$\begingroup\$ @Adám Added testcase \$\endgroup\$
    – emanresu A
    Commented Jan 25, 2022 at 20:09
  • \$\begingroup\$ @emanresuA The last text case contradicts "until it has less than 3 elements left". \$\endgroup\$
    – Adám
    Commented Jan 25, 2022 at 20:13
  • \$\begingroup\$ @Adám You asked for that testcase. But if it's invalid, I'll remove it. \$\endgroup\$
    – emanresu A
    Commented Jan 25, 2022 at 20:15
  • \$\begingroup\$ @emanresuA It isn't invalid per se, but your spec is odd. Why not say "until the length of each dimension is less than 3"? \$\endgroup\$
    – Adám
    Commented Jan 25, 2022 at 20:16
2
\$\begingroup\$

Play a chess-like game

Your task is to build a program that plays chess. However, it doesn't know how the pieces move before the game begins. In fact, each time it sits down at the board the pieces are different!

The game

This game is played on a 6x6 board, looking roughly like:

123451
pppppp
......
......
pppppp
123451

Each game has a time control of 1+1 (1 minute, plus 1 second per move). One piece (of 2345) is selected to be the king, and the game ends when any of the following occur:

  • A king is captured (a win for the capturing player)
  • 50 moves pass without a piece being captured or a pawn moving (a draw)
  • One player runs out of time or attempts an invalid move. (a loss for that player)

The pieces

Pawns

Each player has 6 pawns. Pawns have at least one possible capturing move and at least one non-capturing move that moves it forward. If a pawn moves into a space on the last rank, it may promote into any non-king piece. I've listed white's moves; blacks are mirrored. Pawns may have any or all of the following:

Capturing or non-capturing

.x.
... x.x .x. ...
.p. .p. .p. xpx

Capturing only

.p. .p.
x.x .x.

Example:
In a game, pawns may be able to move to

...
.x.
xpx

And capture pieces in

x.x
.p.
xxx

Major Pieces

The major pieces are more varied, but all of their moves are symmetric. If a major piece can move to a space, it can also capture on that space. Possible moves include (not necessarily exhaustive):

.x. x.x
xPx .P.
.x. x.x

These moves may or may not include the ability to jump over pieces in between:

.x.x. x.x.x
x...x .....
..P.. x.P.x
x...x .....
.x.x. x.x.x

These moves extend across the whole board:

.x... x.x.. P....
xPxxx .P... ..x..
.x... x.x.. .x..x
.x... ...x. .....
.x... ....x ..x..

Each piece will have at least one of these (or others - no guarantees will be made that other movesets will not be included). A piece can have any number of these sets of moves. The two "1"s will have the same moves.

The controller

I haven't built this; I want to gauge interest first.

A potential spec for the controller (have to work out how it communicates):

// Return a list of possible moves in that game state
// If piece is passed (a 2-element array - [x,y]) then only moves which that piece can make are returned
getMoves(board, player, piece = null) => board[]

// Returns the number of milliseconds that player has remaining on their clock.
getTime(player) => float

// Move the piece at origin to destination
makeMove(origin, destination, promotion = null) => void

The tournament

There will be a round-robin tournament played, with as many rounds as possible. Each game will have its pieces randomized at the start, then the bots will play a game as white and a game as black (using the same pieces).

Sandbox

  • Does this sound like an interesting challenge (would it be more than just "fork stockfish")?
  • Would it be alright to restrict this to javascript?
\$\endgroup\$
4
  • 2
    \$\begingroup\$ If you restrict it to a single language, C++ doesn't seem like a very good choice. This KotH will already probably have a high barrier of entry, and a lot of people here probably won't know C++ well enough to bother trying to compete at all. \$\endgroup\$
    – rydwolf
    Commented Feb 2, 2022 at 21:40
  • \$\begingroup\$ @taRadvylfsriksushilani Fair point. Performance is a non-negligible factor here, so it's likely that if I don't restrict it to a single language, python or similar may not be able to compete. Restricting it to a single language would alleviate that risk. Python would be my next choice - and I might have to loosen the time control for that. \$\endgroup\$ Commented Feb 2, 2022 at 21:47
  • 2
    \$\begingroup\$ Do you know JS? If so, that's a good middle-ground between C++ and Python in terms of performance and accessiblity, and it has the advantage of being able to port it to the browser so people can test bots more easily. \$\endgroup\$
    – rydwolf
    Commented Feb 2, 2022 at 22:01
  • \$\begingroup\$ @taRadvylfsriksushilani Interesting. I thought JS was considerably worse than python! Yeah, could do that, then. \$\endgroup\$ Commented Feb 2, 2022 at 22:16
2
\$\begingroup\$

Retaining Water

\$\endgroup\$
5
  • 1
    \$\begingroup\$ I like this challenge but I think the string input is unnecessary. A 2D list of ints would be a better format in my opinion. \$\endgroup\$
    – Wheat Wizard Mod
    Commented Feb 6, 2022 at 11:29
  • \$\begingroup\$ can i say "- You are allowed to take in the input as 2D list of integers " @WheatWizard? \$\endgroup\$
    – DialFrost
    Commented Feb 7, 2022 at 0:52
  • 1
    \$\begingroup\$ I would just have the input be a 2D list of integers. I can hardly imagine it being more convenient to take the current format. \$\endgroup\$
    – Wheat Wizard Mod
    Commented Feb 7, 2022 at 0:53
  • \$\begingroup\$ do i manually change the entire input, or just write The input is in the form of a 2D list of integers \$\endgroup\$
    – DialFrost
    Commented Feb 7, 2022 at 0:58
  • \$\begingroup\$ @WheatWizard is my challenge now ok? \$\endgroup\$
    – DialFrost
    Commented Feb 7, 2022 at 1:38
2
\$\begingroup\$

Can I wall glitch to there?

Posted

\$\endgroup\$
2
\$\begingroup\$

Slice the source code - Cops and Robbers

\$\endgroup\$
7
  • 1
    \$\begingroup\$ Try to clarify the robbers challenge and add a example \$\endgroup\$
    – Fmbalbuena
    Commented Jan 27, 2022 at 16:07
  • \$\begingroup\$ Challenges should be self contained: i.e. copy the relevant info from the link onto the question \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jan 27, 2022 at 16:11
  • \$\begingroup\$ @Fmbalbuena Added a example. \$\endgroup\$ Commented Jan 28, 2022 at 15:13
  • \$\begingroup\$ not bad although i never understand cops and robbers challenge +1 \$\endgroup\$
    – DialFrost
    Commented Jan 31, 2022 at 5:34
  • \$\begingroup\$ Really love it. Can't wait for it to be posted! \$\endgroup\$
    – ophact
    Commented Jan 31, 2022 at 12:45
  • \$\begingroup\$ @DLosc done.... \$\endgroup\$ Commented Feb 9, 2022 at 18:54
  • \$\begingroup\$ It would also be good to add examples for negative indices and a negative step value. If people haven't seen Python-style slicing before, they might be very confused about why [::-1] is "reverse the code." \$\endgroup\$
    – DLosc
    Commented Feb 9, 2022 at 20:04
1
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