What is the explanation of this code? - list

I am trying to learn Prolog. I have a problem and the solution for that in Prolog. Though I am unable to understand the code completely.
The problem is -
Write a procedure mydelete( X, HasXs, OneLessXs ) that returns
% ?- mydelete( 2, [1,2,3,4], L ) . --> L = [1,3,4]
% ?- mydelete( 2, [1,2,3,2], L ) . --> L = [1,3,2] ; L = [1,2,3]
Basically, the problem is t remove the member one by one which matches X and print the result after each removal.
I have a solution , but, I am exactly, not sure how this code is working.
mydelete(X,[X|T],T).
mydelete(X,[H|T1],[H|T2]) :- mydelete(X,T1,T2).
As per my understanding, the first line, displays the L = ... when it finds a match with X in the head of the list.
In the second line of the code, it simply pops out the head from the input list and send that updated list recursively.
But, here, we haven't defined T2.
Let us consider an example for that.
mydelete( 2, [1,2,3,4], L ) . --> this is the call.
X=2, list is = [1,2,3,4], so, H=1, T=[2,3,4].
So, it does not execute line 1 of the code. Now, it comes to the second line of the code.
mydelete(X,[H|T1],[H|T2]) :- mydelete(X,T1,T2).
Here also X=2, H =1, T1=[2,3,4], T2= .
So, on the next recursion,
X=2, list = [2,3,4], H matches X, thus line 1 will get executed.
Therefore, X=2, T=[3,4]
So, it should print = [3,4].(I know, [1,3,4] is the right answer. I am not able to understand the explanation behind this code)
My, question is, what is wrong in my understanding?
And, what is the use of [H|T2] in
mydelete(X,[H|T1],[H|T2]) :- mydelete(X,T1,T2).
Thanks! Please help me out!
edit: I tried removing H from [H|T2]. It is printing [3,4]. How H is adding 1 as the prefix to the list [3,4] ?

The best way to think of this as an imperative programmer is that the last argument is kind of the return value. You see that the first call you make "returns" [H|T2], not merely T2 this is how the first element of the list remains: after recursing to compute the value of T2, mydelete is adding H (which happens to equal 1 in this case) to the start of the returned list.

What is the use of [H|T2]?
In your explanations, you forgot to consider that the third argument, L, is being unified with [H|T2]. Up to this point, L was free (in your case), and now you know that it is a list starting with H. The rest of the list T2 is now the third argument to the recursive call and will be unified likewise, until you reach the base case.
By the way, what happens when your list is empty?

Related

Prolog: Resolvent/Resolution solver and recursion

Given 2 lists of positiv and negativ literals (representing clauses) I want to to get all possible Resolutions of these 2 clauses.
resolution([pos(X)|T],[H2|T2],R):- select(neg(X), [H2|T2],L),union(T,L,R).
resolution([neg(X)|T],[H2|T2],R):- select(pos(X),[H2|T2],L),union(T,L,R).
resolution([H|T],[H2|T2],R):-resolution(T,[H2|T2],R).
This works for the first literal of the first list ([H|T]) but for after that due to how I wrote the recursion I lose the Head of the list after every recursion so that I don't get the whole union of my 2 original list but the union of the second list and the the subset of the first list after the deleted literal.
I couldn't figure out how I (try to) do a resolution for every element of the first list with the second whilst keeping all elements of the first list.
My idea is something like this:
resolution([[_]|[pos(X)|T]],[H2|T2],R):- select(neg(X),[H2|T2],L),select(pos(X),[[_]|[pos(X)|T]],Q),union(Q,L,R).
resolution([[_]|[neg(X)|T]],[H2|T2],R):- select(pos(X),[H2|T2],L),select(neg(X),[[_]|[neg(X)|T]],Q),union(Q,L,R).
resolution([[_]|[neg(X)|T]],[H2|T2],R):-resolution([[[_]|[neg(X)]]|T],[H2|T2],R).
Trying to shift the element I am using for the resolution while keeping my list how it was but this doesn't work at all at the moment.
What the upper codes outputs:
?-resolution([pos(1),neg(3),pos(4)],[neg(1),pos(3),neg(5)],R).
R = [neg(3), pos(4), pos(3), neg(5)]
R = [pos(4), neg(1), neg(5)]
(resolution with pos(1),neg(1) and neg(3),pos(3))
What it I want it to output:
?-resolution([pos(1),neg(3),pos(4)],[neg(1),pos(3),neg(5)],R).
R = [neg(3), pos(4), pos(3), neg(5)]
R = [pos(1),pos(4), neg(1), neg(5)]
Keeping the pos(1) of the first list.
"Shifting" an element to the "result" list can be done by using the list constructor [_ | _] in the "result" parameter as well, i.e., changing the last clause of your original program to:
resolution([pos(X)|T],[H2|T2],R):- select(neg(X), [H2|T2],L),union(T,L,R).
resolution([neg(X)|T],[H2|T2],R):- select(pos(X),[H2|T2],L),union(T,L,R).
resolution([H|T], [H2|T2], [H | R]) :-
resolution(T, [H2|T2], R).
And there you go:
?- resolution([pos(1),neg(3),pos(4)],[neg(1),pos(3),neg(5)],R).
R = [neg(3), pos(4), pos(3), neg(5)] ;
R = [pos(1), pos(4), neg(1), neg(5)] ;
false.
This isn't perfect, for what if H is already present in R? It would be duplicated in the result. So maybe change to this:
resolution([pos(X)|T],[H2|T2],R):- select(neg(X), [H2|T2],L),union(T,L,R).
resolution([neg(X)|T],[H2|T2],R):- select(pos(X),[H2|T2],L),union(T,L,R).
resolution([H|T], [H2|T2], Resolvent) :-
resolution(T, [H2|T2], R),
union([H], R, Resolvent).
It's a bit of a pity that this loses the tail recursivity of the predicate.
For whatever it's worth, I don't see why you bother with recursion at all. What you are trying to do amounts to selecting an element from a list and keeping all other elements around. Your implementation of this, with the small fix from my first version, is basically an unfolded version of select/3 itself. Why not go full select/3? Like this:
resolution(ClauseA, ClauseB, Resolvent) :-
select(Literal, ClauseA, RestA),
literal_opposite(Literal, OppositeLiteral),
select(OppositeLiteral, ClauseB, RestB),
union(RestA, RestB, Resolvent).
literal_opposite(pos(X), neg(X)).
literal_opposite(neg(X), pos(X)).
This is actually pretty close to a textbook definition of resolution.

Prolog: compare list elements and sum

New to prolog and trying to implement the following function that takes 3 lists:
True if lists are the same length
True if elements of third list is sum of the two lists
Example: fn([1,2,3],[4,5,6],[5,7,9]) returns true. Note that the sum is element-wise addition.
This is what I have so far:
fn([],[],[]).
fn([_|T1], [_|T2], [_|T3]) :-
fn(T1,T2,T3), % check they are same length
fn(T1,T2,N1), % check that T3=T1+T2
N1 is T1+T2,
N1 = T3.
From what I understand, the error is due to the base case (it has empty lists which causes error with evaluation of addition?)
Thanks for any help and explanations!
In addition to #GuyCoder's answer, I would point out that it is worthwhile to consider using one of the maplist predicates from library(apply) when modifying all elements of lists. You can use a predicate to describe the relation between three numbers...
:- use_module(library(apply)). % for maplist/4
num_num_sum(X,Y,S) :-
S is X+Y.
... and subsequently use maplist/4 to apply it to entire lists:
fn(X,Y,Z) :-
maplist(num_num_sum,X,Y,Z).
This predicate yields the desired results if the first two lists are fully instantiated:
?- fn([1,2,3],[4,5,6],X).
X = [5,7,9]
However, due to the use of is/2 you get instantiation errors if the first two lists contain variables:
?- fn([1,A,3],[4,5,6],[5,7,9]).
ERROR at clause 1 of user:num_num_sum/3 !!
INSTANTIATION ERROR- X is _+B: expected bound value
?- fn([1,2,3],[4,5,A],[5,7,9]).
ERROR at clause 1 of user:num_num_sum/3 !!
INSTANTIATION ERROR- X is A+B: expected bound value
If you only want to use the predicate for lists of integers, you can use CLP(FD) to make it more versatile:
:- use_module(library(apply)).
:- use_module(library(clpfd)). % <- use CLP(FD)
int_int_sum(X,Y,S) :-
S #= X+Y. % use CLP(FD) constraint #=/2 instead of is/2
fnCLP(X,Y,Z) :-
maplist(int_int_sum,X,Y,Z).
With this definition the previously problematic queries work as well:
?- fnCLP([1,A,3],[4,5,6],[5,7,9]).
A = 2
?- fnCLP([1,2,3],[4,5,A],[5,7,9]).
A = 6
Even the most general query yields results with this version:
?- fnCLP(X,Y,Z).
X = Y = Z = [] ? ;
X = [_A],
Y = [_B],
Z = [_C],
_A+_B#=_C ? ;
X = [_A,_B],
Y = [_C,_D],
Z = [_E,_F],
_A+_C#=_E,
_B+_D#=_F ? ;
.
.
.
Since the numbers in the above answers are not uniquely determined, you get residual goals instead of actual numbers. In order to get actual numbers in the answers, you have to restrict the range of two of the lists and label them subsequently (see documentation for details), e.g. to generate lists containing the numbers 3,4,5 in the first list and 6,7,8 in the second list, you can query:
label the lists
restrict the domain | |
v v v v
?- fnCLP(X,Y,Z), X ins 3..5, Y ins 6..8, label(X), label(Y).
X = Y = Z = [] ? ;
X = [3],
Y = [6],
Z = [9] ? ;
X = [3],
Y = [7],
Z = [10] ? ;
.
.
.
X = [3,4],
Y = [6,7],
Z = [9,11] ? ;
X = [3,4],
Y = [6,8],
Z = [9,12] ? ;
.
.
.
On an additional note: there are also clp libraries for booleans (CLP(B)), rationals and reals (CLP(Q,R)) that you might find interesting.
From what I understand, the error is due to the base case.
I don't see it that way.
The first problem I see is that you are trying to process list which leads to thinking about using DCGs, but since you are new I will avoid that route.
When processing list you typically process the head of the list then pass the tail back to the predicate using recursion.
e.g. for length of list you would have
ln([],N,N).
ln([_|T],N0,N) :-
N1 is N0+1,
ln(T,N1,N).
ln(L,N) :-
ln(L,0,N).
The predicate ln/2 is used to set up the initial count of 0 and the predicate ln/3 does the work using recursion. Notice how the head of the list is taken off the front of the list and the tail of the list is passed recursively onto the predicate again. When the list is empty the predicate ln([],N,N). unifies, in this case think copies, the intermediate count from the second position into the third position, which it what is passed back with ln/2.
Now back to your problem.
The base case is fine
fn([],[],[]).
There are three list and for each one look at the list as [H|T]
fn([H1|T1],[H2|T2],[H3|T3])
and the call to do the recursion on the tail is
fn(T1,T2,T3)
all that is left is to process the heads which is
H3 is H1 + H2
putting it all together gives us
fn([],[],[]).
fn([H1|T1], [H2|T2], [H3|T3]) :-
H3 is H1 + H2,
fn(T1,T2,T3).
and a quick few checks.
?- fn([],[],[]).
true.
?- fn([1],[1],[2]).
true.
?- fn([1,2],[3,4],[4,6]).
true.
?- fn([1,2],[3,4,5],[4,6,5]).
false.
With regards to the two conditions. When I look at exercises problems for logic programming they sometimes give a condition like True if lists are the same length or some other condition that returns true. I tend to ignore those at first and concentrate on getting the other part done first, in this case elements of third list is sum of the two lists then I check to see if the other conditions are correct. For most simple classroom exercises they are. I sometimes think teacher try to give out these extra conditions to confuse the student, but in reality the are there just to clarify how the code should work.

replacing elements between two lists using prolog

My task is to make myReplace(E1,L1,E2,L2) such that the very first occurrence of E1 in L1 gets replaced by E2 and is returned in L2. I have written the below described code and it is working properly.
myReplace(E1,[],E2,[]).
myReplace(E1,[E1|Xs],E2,[E2|Ys]):-
myReplace(E1,Xs,E1,Ys).
myReplace(E1,[H|Hs],E2,[H|Ts]):-
E1 \= H,
myReplace(E1,Hs,E2,Ts).
However, For example myReplace(2,[1,2,3,2,1],5,X) should give X = [1,5,3,2,1] and X = [1,2,3,5,1]. But my code is only giving one solution which is X = [1,5,3,2,1].
Similarly, when myReplace(2,X,5,[1,5,3,5,1]) should backtrack over the solutions X = [1,2,3,5,1] and X = [1,5,3,2,1] only, but my solution gives me one more solution as X = [1,5,3,5,1].
Could you please help me resolve this.
Thank you :)
What about
myReplace(E1,[E1|Xs],E2,[E2|Xs]).
myReplace(E1,[H|Hs],E2,[H|Ts]):-
myReplace(E1,Hs,E2,Ts).
?
If I'm not wrong, this impose one (and only one) replacement.
Take in count that you have to delete
myReplace(E1,[],E2,[]).
otherwise you get L1 = L2 (no replacement) as a solution.
And observe that, as pointed by Lurker, this isn't "the very first occurrence of E1 in L1 gets replaced".
If I understand your question, you want to get all answers from substituting each one occurrence of E1 in L1. You can get the backtracking for free if you use append/3 for this:
my_replace(X, As, Y, Bs) :-
append(As_front, [X|As_back], As),
append(As_front, [Y|As_back], Bs).
With this definition I get:
?- my_replace(2,[1,2,3,2,1],5,X).
X = [1, 5, 3, 2, 1] ;
X = [1, 2, 3, 5, 1] ;
false
See the other solution to see how to see what the problem with your original code was.

Re-organizing a list in prolog

I am trying to write some Prolog code to take a list such as:
[[park, joe], [park, bob], [park, kate], [school, joe], [zoo, amy], [zoo, ted]].
and organizes the list into the form:
[[park,[joe, bob, kate]], [school,[joe]], [zoo,[amy, ted]]].
It can be assumed that all matching heads of each element (park = park, zoo = zoo) are directly next to each other in the list because the code I made to create the list sorts it in alphabetical order. I can't seem to figure out how to accomplish this and seem to get errors at every turn :(. Below is the code that I have so far in the last state that it ran without errors and I will try to explain what I was thinking.
merge([],[]).
merge([First|Rest], Z) :-
merge(Rest, U),
[Meet1, Person1] = First,
( =(U, []) -> % beginning case from recursion, U is empty
Meet2 = [],
Person2 = [];
[[Meet2|Person2]|_] = U),
( =(Meet1, Meet2) -> % Case of matching heads, combine the tails
print('Match '),
append([First], U, Z);
print('No-match '), % otherwise, not matching
append([First], U, Z) ).
So what I was trying to do is use appends to add all of the changes to U and return it to the console with Z. such as,
( =(Meet1, Meet2) ->
append(Person1, Person2, Combpersons),
append([Meet1], [Combpersons], T),
append(T, U, Z);
...no match code here..).
However my code keeps ending prematurely with a false when I try to change or add appends like this in the first block of code I put here. Even a change such as turning append([First], U, Z) into append([Meet1], U, Z) makes my code end with a false and I am not understanding why. Any help/hints on creating a solution would be appreciated.
I think that learning any language it's a process where low and high level issues must be interleaved. So far, you're learning the basic syntax. But why you use such unreadable constructs ? And of course, any programming language builds upon a set of patterns, usually covered by libraries. Consider
l2p([A,B],A-B).
?- maplist(l2p,[[park, joe], [park, bob], [park, kate], [school, joe], [zoo, amy], [zoo, ted]], L),group_pairs_by_key(L,G).
L = [park-joe, park-bob, park-kate, school-joe, zoo-amy, zoo-ted],
G = [park-[joe, bob, kate], school-[joe], zoo-[amy, ted]].
Anyway, here is your code restructured:
merge([],[]).
merge([[Meet, Person]|Rest], Z) :-
merge(Rest, U),
( U = []
-> % beginning case from recursion, U is empty
Z = [[Meet, [Person]]]
; U = [[Meet, Persons] | Rest1]
-> % Case of matching heads, combine the tails
Z = [[Meet, [Person | Persons]] | Rest1]
; % otherwise, not matching
Z = [[Meet, [Person]] | U]
).
If you had your initial list as a list of pairs instead, you could use library(pairs), available in SWI-Prolog.
?- group_pairs_by_key([park-joe, park-bob, park-kate, school-joe, zoo-amy, zoo-ted], G).
G = [park-[joe, bob, kate], school-[joe], zoo-[amy, ted]].
Using the library gives you more than just this "reorganization". There is also library(ugraphs), which might be better suited, depending on what you are doing.
Your code fails, because you are trying to extract the place and the person before checking if there are any.
No use for append here, the reordering looks pretty complicated, but I did my best with the variable names. Furthermore you'll only need one ->: If you hadn't found a tuple with the same first coordinate, you'll want a to start a new, it doesn't matter if there was none before.
merge([],[]).
merge([[Place,Person]|Rest], [[Place,Group]|OtherGroups]) :-
merge(Rest, U),
(U = [[Place,Others]|OtherGroups] ->
Group = [Person|Others];
[OtherGroups,Group] = [U, [Person]]).
Edit: I changed the solution for readablity reasons.

Prolog append to head

I am learning Prolog right now and I am trying to write a predicate newhead/3 that simply appends the second parameter to the first parameter that represents a list.
So newhead([1,2],3,R) should yield R = [3,1,2].
I wrote the following and I am confused as to what this error message says as well as why the logic of my code does not seem to be correct.
newhead([H|T],E,R) :-
L is [H|T],
R is [E|L].
Or:
newhead(L,E,R) :-
R is [E|L].
Also doesn't work. This seems like it should be a pretty trivial operation but I can't believe that it could need recursion.
I appreciate any help.
You can simply write:
new_head(Tail, Head, [Head| Tail]).
You can use the predicate 'append/3'.
apped([3],[1,2],R).
R = [3,1,2]
or
append([X],[1,2],R), X=3.
R = [3,1,2]
I am sure that you already found your answer :) but I want to explain my answer too.
My understanding: first parameter is list and aim is the make the second argument head of the list.
Here is code:
new([],F,[F]). % if your list is empty.
new([X|XS],F,[F,X|XS]):-
new(XS,F,YS).
Output:
?- new([2,3],1,R).
R = [1, 2, 3].
?- new([],1,R).
R = [1].
?- new([2,3],[1],R).
R = [[1], 2, 3].