150 coding challenges in 25 days

What I learned from attempting Advent of Code 2017, 2016 & 2015 all at one go.

Yong Jun

24 Jan 2018

About me

Advent of Code a series of small programming puzzles for a variety of skill levels.

 

They are self-contained and are just as appropriate for an expert who wants to stay sharp as they are for a beginner who is just learning to code.

 

Each puzzle calls upon different skills and has two parts that build on a theme.

Leaderboard

Personal Stat

Global Stat

If you need a little help

Some things I've learned

Generators

function* generator () {
  // do something
  yield 'someValue'

  // do some more thing
  yield 'anotherValue'
}


const iterator = generator()

console.log(iterator.next())
// {value: 'someValue', done: false}

console.log(iterator.next())
// {value: 'anotherValue', done: false}

console.log(iterator.next())
// {value: undefined, done: true}

AoC 2017 Day 3: Spiral Memory

Right x 1

Up x 1

Left x 2

Down x 2

Right x 3

Up x 3

Left x 4

Down x 4

function * traverse () {
  let step = 1
  let x = 0
  let y = 0
  yield [x, y]
  while (true) {
    for (let right = step; right > 0; right--) {
      yield [++x, y]
    }
    for (let up = step; up > 0; up--) {
      yield [x, ++y]
    }
    step++
    for (let left = step; left > 0; left--) {
      yield [--x, y]
    }
    for (let down = step; down > 0; down--) {
      yield [x, --y]
    }
    step++
  }
}

function manhattanDistance (target) {
  let coordinates
  const location = traverse()

  for (let i = 0; i < target; i++) {
    coordinates = location.next().value
  }
  return Math.abs(coordinates[0]) + Math.abs(coordinates[1])
}

Solution

Why use a generator?

  • Rather than create an object that maintain internal state by variables assignment (explicit)

  • Internal state can be implicit in the position of the yield statement
  • Behave sort of like the goto statement from old school imperative programming

Another example

AoC 2015 Day 14:

Reindeer Olympics

function * reindeer (speed, fly, rest) {
  let distance = 0
  while (true) {
    for (let i = 0; i < fly; i++) {
      distance += speed
      yield distance
    }
    for (let i = 0; i < rest; i++) {
      yield distance
    }
  }
}

RegEx

AoC 2016 Day 7:

Internet Protocol Version 7

Task:

  Find ABBA

 

Solution:

function containsAbba (str) {
  const match = str.match(/([a-z])([a-z])\2\1/)
  if (!match) return false
  if (match[1] !== match[2]) return true
  return containsAbba(str.slice(match.index + 1))
}

Tail Call

Optimization

AoC 2015 Day 10:

Elves Look, Elves Say

Solution

// no proper tail call

function lookNsay (str) {
  const match = str.match(/(.)(\1*)/)
  if (match[0].length === str.length) return match[0].length + match[1]
  return match[0].length + match[1] + lookNsay(str.slice(match[0].length))
}

// with proper tail call

function lookNsay (str, prefix = '') {
  const match = str.match(/(.)(\1*)/)
  if (match[0].length === str.length) return prefix + match[0].length + match[1]
  return lookNsay(str.slice(match[0].length), prefix + match[0].length + match[1])
}

Limitations

  • 'use strict'
  • --harmony
  • Only node 6 & 7

Workaround

  • rewrite recursion into iteration
  • use a stack
  • eg. Depth-first-search

Enumeration

AoC 2015 Day 17:

No Such Thing as Too Much

Task:

  Given containers of various sizes (eg. 20, 15, 10, 5, and 5).

  Find how many different combinations total up to a given capacity.

  For example if required total is 25, four ways are possible:

  • 15 and 10
  • 20 and 5 (the first 5)
  • 20 and 5 (the second 5)
  • 15, 5, and 5

Solution:

  Enumerate all possible assignment combination

  Eg. 000, 001, 010, 011, 100, 101, 110, 111

AoC 2015 Day 9:

All in a Single Night

Task:

  Given distances between each location pair, find the

  shortest route where every location is visited exactly once.

 

Solution:

  Enumerate all possible permutation

  Eg. ABC, ACB, BAC, BCA, CAB, CBA

AoC 2015 Day 13:

Knights of the Dinner Table

Task:

  Find the ideal seating arrangement around a round

  dining table

 

Solution:

  Fix a start point and enumerate all possible

  permutation that start and end with that point. Eg.

  • A > B > C > D > A
  • A > B > D > C > A
  • A > C > B > D > A
  • A > C > D > B > A

AoC 2015 Day 15:

Science for Hungry People

Task:

  With exactly 100 teaspoons of ingredients. Find

  the ideal recipe

 

Solution:

  Enumeration all possible split combinations. Eg.

0/0/100
0/1/99 1/0/99
0/2/98 1/2/98 2/1/98
0/3/97 1/2/97 2/1/97 3/0/97

Enumerate Assignment Combinations

  • Count up from 0 to
  • Convert number to binary representation using Number.prototype.toString(2)
  • Left pad string with zeros
  • Convert to array using String.prototype.split('')
2^n - 1
function getAssignments (items, groups = 2) {
  const combinations = []
  const nCombinations = Math.pow(groups, items)
  const zeroPad = '0'.repeat(items)
  for (let i = 0; i < nCombinations; i++) {
    const combiString = (zeroPad + i.toString(groups)).slice(-items)
    const combination = combiString.split('')
    if (groups === 2) combinations.push(combination.map(v => +v))
    else combinations.push(combination)
  }
  return combinations
}

Implementation

Enumerate Split Combination

  • Instead of enumerating units, enumerate cuts. Eg.                        

 

 

 

 

 

  • If you have k different ingredients, the number of cuts to enumerate will be k - 1
  • Pick any position that is between last cut's position and N inclusive
  • Cuts can overlap
  • Subtract adjacent cut index to get units of ingredient
  • i.e.
1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1

First cut is always at 0

Last cut is always at N

Second cut at 2

Third cut also at 2

Fourth cut at 5

unit_i = cut_i - cut_{i-1}

Implementation

function getSplitCombinations (total, items) {
  const combinations = []
  function recurse (division, i) {
    if (division.length < items - 1) {
      while (i <= total) {
        recurse(division.concat(i), i)
        i++
      }
    } else {
      division = [0, ...division, total]
      const combination = []
      for (let i = 1; i < division.length; i++) {
        combination.push(division[i] - division[i - 1])
      }
      combinations.push(combination)
    }
  }
  recurse([], 0)
  return combinations
}

More enumeration helpers

How about lazy enumeration?

AoC 2015 Day 24:

It Hangs in the Balance

Task:

  Split cargo (28 pieces) into 3 groups of equal weight.

  Pick combination with least items in the first group.

 

Analysis:

  Total possible combinations is                                                       !!!

  Takes too long to enumerate every possible combination.

  Need a way to exit early once a match is found.

3^{28} = 22,876,792,454,961

Iterables

const iterable = {
  [Symbol.iterator]: function* () {
    let n = 0
    while (true) {
      yield n++
    }
  }
}

for (let n of iterable) {
  if (n >= 10) break
}

Example

// lazy version of assignment enumerator

function getAssignments (items, groups = 2) {
  const nCombinations = Math.pow(groups, items)
  const zeroPad = '0'.repeat(items)
  return {
    [Symbol.iterator]: function* () {
      for (let i = 0; i < nCombinations; i++) {
        const combiString = (zeroPad + i.toString(groups)).slice(-items)
        const combination = combiString.split('')
        if (groups === 2) yield combination.map(v => +v)
        else yield combination
      }
    }
  }
}
// wrong use

const iterable = getAssignment(n)
Array.from(iterable)
[...iterable]
// correct use

const iterable = getAssignment(n)
for (let item of iterable) {
  if (/* condition met */) return item
}

Graph search

Breadth-First-Search

Depth-First-Search

function bfs (root) {
  const visited = {}
  const unvisited = []
  unvisited.push([root, 0])
  
  while (unvisited.length > 0) {
    const [next, steps] = unvisited.shift()
    
    if (next in visited) continue
    visited[next] = 1

    if (found) return steps

    next.children
      .forEach(child => {
        unvisited.push([child, steps + 1]
      })
  }
}
function dfs (root) {
  const visited = {}
  const unvisited = []
  unvisited.push([root, 0])
  
  while (unvisited.length > 0) {
    const [next, steps] = unvisited.pop()
    
    if (next in visited) continue
    visited[next] = 1

    if (found) return steps

    next.children
      .sort(sortFunc)
      .reverse()
      .forEach(child => {
        unvisited.push([child, steps + 1]
      })
  }
}

Dealing with coding task of the assembly language kind

  • Use Chrome inspector
  • node --inspect-brk script.js
  • Add debugger statement

Wrapping up

  • Work it out on paper
  • Premature optimization
  • Readability & Extensibility > Efficiency & Speed
  • Some knowledge of computation complexity is helpful

All solutions

150 coding challenges in 25 days

By yongjun21

150 coding challenges in 25 days

What I've learned from attempting Advent of Code 2017, 2016 & 2015 all at one go.

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