Call recursive function in std::function - c++

I just wrote a thread pool using C++11/14 std::thread objects and use tasks in the worker queue. I encountered some weird behaviour when calling recursive functions in lambda expressions. The following code crashes if you implement fac() in a recursive fashion (both with clang 3.5 and gcc 4.9):
#include <functional>
#include <vector>
std::size_t fac(std::size_t x) {
// This will crash (segfault).
// if (x == 1) return 1;
// else return fac(x-1)*x;
// This, however, works fine.
auto res = 1;
for (auto i = 2; i < x; ++i) {
res *= x;
}
return res;
}
int main() {
std::vector<std::function<void()> > functions;
for (auto i = 0; i < 10; ++i) {
functions.emplace_back([i]() { fac(i); });
}
for (auto& fn : functions) {
fn();
}
return 0;
}
It does, however, work fine with the iterative version above. What am I missing?

for (auto i = 0; i < 10; ++i) {
functions.emplace_back([i]() { fac(i); });
The first time through that loop, i is going to be set to zero, so you're executing:
fac(0);
Doing so with the recursive definition:
if (x == 1) return 1;
else return fac(x-1)*x;
means that the else block will execute, and hence x will wrap around to whatever the maximum size_t value is (as it's unsigned).
Then it's going to run from there down to 1, consuming one stack frame each time. At a minimum, that's going to consume 65,000 or so stack frames (based on the minimum allowed value of size_t from the standards), but probably more, much more.
That's what causing your crash. The fix is relatively simple. Since 0! is defined as 1, you can simply change your statement to be:
if (x <= 1)
return 1;
return fac (x-1) * x;
But you should keep in mind that recursive functions are best suited to those cases where the solution space reduces quickly, a classic example being the binary search, where the solution space is halved every time you recur.
Functions that don't reduce solution space quickly are usually prone to stack overflow problems (unless the optimiser can optimise away the recursion). You may still run into problems if you pass in a big enough number and it's no real different to adding together two unsigned numbers with the bizarre (though I actually saw it put forward as a recursive example many moons ago):
def addu (unsigned a, b):
if b == 0:
return a
return addu (a + 1, b - 1)
So, in your case, I'd stick with the iterative solution, albeit making it bug-free:
auto res = 1;
for (auto i = 2; i <= x; ++i) // include the limit with <=.
res *= i; // multiply by i, not x.

Both definitions have different behavior for x=0. The loop will be fine as it uses the less-than operator:
auto res = 1;
for (auto i = 2; i < x; ++i) {
res *= x;
}
However,
if (x == 1) return 1;
else return fac(x-1)*x;
Results in a quasi-infinite loop as x == 1 is false and x-1 yields the largest possible value of std::size_t (typically 264-1).

The recursive version does not take care of the case for x == 0.
You need:
std::size_t fac(std::size_t x) {
if (x == 1 || x == 0 ) return 1;
return fac(x-1)*x;
}
or
std::size_t fac(std::size_t x) {
if (x == 0 ) return 1;
return fac(x-1)*x;
}

Related

Minimum cuts on a rectangle to make into squares

I'm trying to solve this problem:
Given an a×b rectangle, your task is to cut it into squares. On each move you can select a rectangle and cut it into two rectangles in such a way that all side lengths remain integers. What is the minimum possible number of moves?
My logic is that the minimum number of cuts means the minimum number of squares; I don't know if it's the correct approach.
I see which side is smaller, Now I know I need to cut bigSide/SmallSide of cuts to have squares of smallSide sides, then I am left with SmallSide and bigSide%smallSide. Then I go on till any side is 0 or both are equal.
#include <iostream>
int main() {
int a, b; std::cin >> a >> b; // sides of the rectangle
int res = 0;
while (a != 0 && b != 0) {
if (a > b) {
if (a % b == 0)
res += a / b - 1;
else
res += a / b;
a = a % b;
} else if (b > a) {
if (b % a == 0)
res += b / a - 1;
else
res += b / a;
b = b % a;
} else {
break;
}
}
std::cout << res;
return 0;
}
When the input is 404 288, my code gives 18, but the right answer is actually 10.
What am I doing wrong?
It seems clear to me that the problem defines each move as cutting a rectangle to two rectangles along the integer lines, and then asks for the minimum number of such cuts. As you can see there is a clear recursive nature in this problem. Once you cut a rectangle to two parts, you can recurse and cut each of them into squares with minimum moves and then sum up the answers. The problem is that the recursion might lead to exponential time complexity which leads us directly do dynamic programming. You have to use memoization to solve it efficiently (worst case time O(a*b*(a+b))) Here is what I'd suggest doing:
#include <iostream>
#include <vector>
using std::vector;
int min_cuts(int a, int b, vector<vector<int> > &mem) {
int min = mem[a][b];
// if already computed, just return the value
if (min > 0)
return min;
// if one side is divisible by the other,
// store min-cuts in 'min'
if (a%b==0)
min= a/b-1;
else if (b%a==0)
min= b/a -1;
// if there's no obvious solution, recurse
else {
// recurse on hight
for (int i=1; i<a/2; i++) {
int m = min_cuts(i,b, mem);
int n = min_cuts(a-i, b, mem);
if (min<0 or m+n+1<min)
min = m + n + 1;
}
// recurse on width
for (int j=1; j<b/2; j++) {
int m = min_cuts(a,j, mem);
int n = min_cuts(a, b-j, mem);
if (min<0 or m+n+1<min)
min = m + n + 1;
}
}
mem[a][b] = min;
return min;
}
int main() {
int a, b; std::cin >> a >> b; // sides of the rectangle
// -1 means the problem is not solved yet,
vector<vector<int> > mem(a+1, vector<int>(b+1, -1));
int res = min_cuts(a,b,mem);
std::cout << res << std::endl;
return 0;
}
The reason the foor loops go up until a/2 and b/2 is that cuting a paper is symmetric: if you cut along vertical line i it is the same as cutting along the line a-i if you flip the paper vertically. This is a little optimization hack that reduces complexity by a factor of 4 overall.
Another little hack is that by knowing that the problem is that if you transpose the paper the result is the same, meaining min_cuts(a,b)=min_cuts(b,a) you can potentially reduce computations by half. But any major further improvement, say a greedy algorithm would take more thinking (if there exists one at all).
The current answer is a good start, especially the suggestions to use memoization or dynamic programming, and potentially efficient enough.
Obviously, all answerers used the first with a sub-par data-structure. Vector-of-Vector has much space and performance overhead, using a (strict) lower triangular matrix stored in an array is much more efficient.
Using the maximum value as sentinel (easier with unsigned) would also reduce complexity.
Finally, let's move to dynamic programming instead of memoization to simplify and get even more efficient:
#include <algorithm>
#include <memory>
#include <utility>
constexpr unsigned min_cuts(unsigned a, unsigned b) {
if (a < b)
std::swap(a, b);
if (a == b || !b)
return 0;
const auto triangle = [](std::size_t n) { return n * (n - 1) / 2; };
const auto p = std::make_unique_for_overwrite<unsigned[]>(triangle(a));
/* const! */ unsigned zero = 0;
const auto f = [&](auto a, auto b) -> auto& {
if (a < b)
std::swap(a, b);
return a == b ? zero : p[triangle(a - 1) + b - 1];
};
for (auto i = 1u; i <= a; ++i) {
for (auto j = 1u; j < i; ++j) {
auto r = -1u;
for (auto k = i / 2; k; --k)
r = std::min(r, f(k, j) + f(i - k, j));
for (auto k = j / 2; k; --k)
r = std::min(r, f(k, i) + f(j - k, i));
f(i, j) = ++r;
}
}
return f(a, b);
}

BigInteger implementation, carry discrepancy

lately, I've been trying to make my on Big Integer class. Right now, I've been doing some prototypes, they almost work. This prototype is not a function, nor a class, just a quick stuff I did to see if it worked.
This is my prototype so far: (it looks a bit ugly with all the casts just to please the compiler)
std::vector<long long unsigned> vec1 {4294967295, 2294967295, 1294967295};
std::vector<long long unsigned> vec2 {4294967295, 2294967295, 1294967295};
int carry {};
for (int i {static_cast<int>(vec1.size()) - 1}; i != -1; --i) {
int unsigned greater = static_cast<unsigned int>(std::max(vec1[i], vec2[i]));
int unsigned result {};
if (i < static_cast<int>(vec2.size())) {
result = static_cast<int unsigned>(vec2[i] + vec1[i] + carry);
} else if (carry) {
result = static_cast<int unsigned>(vec1[i] + carry);
} else {
break;
}
if (result <= greater) {
vec1[i] += result;
carry = 1;
} else {
vec1[i] = result;
carry = 0;
}
}
if (carry) {
vec1.back() += 1;
}
for (auto const n : vec1) {
cout << n;
}
And these is the result:
858993459025899345892589934591
^ ^
858993459045899345902589934590 -> the correct one!
So, what I'm doing wrong?
It does give the same result in gcc and visual studio.
As written, if the highest magnitude addition carries, you end up incrementing the lowest magnitude value:
if (carry) {
vec1.back() += 1;
}
Presumably, the correct behavior would be to expand the vector and allow the carry to occupy the new highest value, e.g.:
if (carry) {
vec1.insert(vec1.begin(), 1);
}
This does mean you end up expanding vec1 (and copying all the existing values, because insertion at the beginning of a vector isn't cheap), which might or might not be correct given the design of your class (your addition operation looks unsafe if vec1 and vec2 don't have matching size, so it's unclear whether vec1 is allowed to expand).
This
if (carry) {
vec1.back() += 1;
}
adds one to the last bin.
Perhaps you want to insert one to the front?

How can I keep only non-zero digits from an integer?

I am currently using the code below that removes all digits equal to zero from an integer.
int removeZeros(int candid)
{
int output = 0;
string s(itoa(candid));
for (int i = s.size(); i != 0; --i)
{
if (s[i] != '0') output = output * 10 + atoi(s[i]);
}
return output;
}
The expected output for e.g. 102304 would be 1234.
Is there a more compact way of doing this by directly working on the integer, that is, not string representation? Is it actually going to be faster?
Here's a way to do it without strings and buffers.
I've only tested this with positive numbers. To make this work with negative numbers is an exercise left up to you.
int removeZeros(int x)
{
int result = 0;
int multiplier = 1;
while (x > 0)
{
int digit = x % 10;
if (digit != 0)
{
int val = digit * multiplier;
result += val;
multiplier *= 10;
}
x = x / 10;
}
return result;
}
For maintainability, I would suggest, don't work directly on the numeric value. You can express your requirements in a very straightforward way using string manipulations, and while it's true that it will likely perform slower than number manipulations, I expect either to be fast enough that you don't have to worry about the performance unless it's in an extremely tight loop.
int removeZeros(int n) {
auto s = std::to_string(n);
s.erase(std::remove(s.begin(), s.end(), '0'), s.end());
return std::stoi(s);
}
As a bonus, this simpler implementation handles negative numbers correctly. For zero, it throws std::invalid_argument, because removing all zeros from 0 doesn't produce a number.
You could try something like this:
template<typename T> T nozeros( T const & z )
{
return z==0 ? 0 : (z%10?10:1)*nozeros(z/10)+(z%10);
}
If you want to take your processing one step further you can do a nice tail recursion , no need for a helper function:
template<typename T> inline T pow10(T p, T res=1)
{
return p==0 ? res : pow10(--p,res*10);
}
template<typename T> T nozeros( T const & z , T const & r=0, T const & zp =0)
{
static int digit =-1;
return not ( z ^ r ) ? digit=-1, zp : nozeros(z/10,z%10, r ? r*pow10(++digit)+zp : zp);
}
Here is how this will work with input 32040
Ret, z, r, zp, digits
-,32040,0,0, -1
-,3204,0,0, -1
-,320,4,0,0, -1
-,32,0,4,4, 0
-,3,2,4, 0
-,0,3,24, 1
-,0,0,324, 2
324,-,-,-, -1
Integer calculations are always faster than actually transforming your integer to string, making comparisons on strings, and looking up strings to turn them back to integers.
The cool thing is that if you try to pass floats you get nice compile time errors.
I claim this to be slightly faster than other solutions as it makes less conditional evaluations which will make it behave better with CPU branch prediction.
int number = 9042100;
stringstream strm;
strm << number;
string str = strm.str();
str.erase(remove(str.begin(), str.end(), '0'), str.end());
number = atoi(str.c_str());
No string representation is used here. I can't say anything about the speed though.
int removezeroes(int candid)
{
int x, y = 0, n = 0;
// I did this to reverse the number as my next loop
// reverses the number while removing zeroes.
while (candid>0)
{
x = candid%10;
n = n *10 + x;
candid /=10;
}
candid = n;
while (candid>0)
{
x = candid%10;
if (x != 0)
y = y*10 + x;
candid /=10;
}
return y;
}
If C++11 is available, I do like this with lambda function:
int removeZeros(int candid){
std::string s=std::to_string(candid);
std::string output;
std::for_each(s.begin(), s.end(), [&](char& c){ if (c != '0') output += c;});
return std::stoi(output);
}
A fixed implementation of g24l recursive solution:
template<typename T> T nozeros(T const & z)
{
if (z == 0) return 0;
if (z % 10 == 0) return nozeros(z / 10);
else return (z % 10) + ( nozeros(z / 10) * 10);
}

Rewriting a recursive function to a non-recursive function

int foo(int x)
{
if (x >= 0)
{
return (x - 1) + 2 * foo(x - 1);
}
else
{
return 1;
}
}
Hi, I need to rewrite this function such that it will be free of recursion. I tried solving this mathematically, but to no avail. I am new to programming, so any help will be much appreciated. Thanks in advance!
I assume that it really should be if(x>0) in your question.
Then examining your function, we see that foo(0)=1 and otherwise that foo(x)=(x-1)+2*foo(x-1). Thus foo(x) only depends on foo(x-1). So, you can simply use an iteration to progress the result
int foo(int x)
{
auto result=1; // result if x=0
for(int n=0; n!=x; ++n) // increment result to desired x
result=n+2*result; // corresponds to (x-1)+2*foo(x-1) in original
return result;
}
If it really was if(x>=0) instead, I leave it as an exercise to you to adapt the code.

What's the best way to get the length of the decimal representation of an int in C++?

What's the best way to write
int NumDigits(int n);
in C++ which would return the number of digits in the decimal representation of the input. For example 11->2, 999->3, -1->2 etc etc.
Straightforward and simple, and independent of sizeof(int):
int NumDigits(int n) {
int digits = 0;
if (n <= 0) {
n = -n;
++digits;
}
while (n) {
n /= 10;
++digits;
}
return digits;
}
//Works for positive integers only
int DecimalLength(int n) {
return floor(log10f(n) + 1);
}
The fastest way is probably a binary search...
//assuming n is positive
if (n < 10000)
if (n < 100)
if (n < 10)
return 1;
else
return 2;
else
if (n < 1000)
return 3;
else
return 4;
else
//etc up to 1000000000
In this case it's about 3 comparisons regardless of input, which I suspect is much faster than a division loop or using doubles.
One way is to (may not be most efficient) convert it to a string and find the length of the string. Like:
int getDigits(int n)
{
std::ostringstream stream;
stream<<n;
return stream.str().length();
}
To extend Arteluis' answer, you could use templates to generate the comparisons:
template<int BASE, int EXP>
struct Power
{
enum {RESULT = BASE * Power<BASE, EXP - 1>::RESULT};
};
template<int BASE>
struct Power<BASE, 0>
{
enum {RESULT = 1};
};
template<int LOW = 0, int HIGH = 8>
struct NumDigits
{
enum {MID = (LOW + HIGH + 1) / 2};
inline static int calculate (int i)
{
if (i < Power<10, MID>::RESULT)
return NumDigits<LOW, MID - 1>::calculate (i);
else
return NumDigits<MID, HIGH>::calculate (i);
}
};
template<int LOW>
struct NumDigits<LOW, LOW>
{
inline static int calculate (int i)
{
return LOW + 1;
}
};
int main (int argc, char* argv[])
{
// Example call.
std::cout << NumDigits<>::calculate (1234567) << std::endl;
return 0;
}
numdigits = snprintf(NULL, 0, "%d", num);
int NumDigits(int n)
{
int digits = 0;
if (n < 0) {
++digits;
do {
++digits;
n /= 10;
} while (n < 0);
}
else {
do {
++digits;
n /= 10;
} while (n > 0);
}
return digits;
}
Edit: Corrected edge case behavior for -2^31 (etc.)
Some very over-complicated solutions have been proposed, including the accepted one.
Consider:
#include <cmath>
#include <cstdlib>
int NumDigits( int num )
{
int digits = (int)log10( (double)abs(num) ) + 1 ;
return num >= 0 ? digits : digits + 1 ;
}
Note that it works for for INT_MIN + 1 ... INT_MAX, because abs(INT_MIN) == INT_MAX + 1 == INT_MIN (due to wrap-around), which in-turn is invalid input to log10(). It is possible to add code for that one case.
Here's a simpler version of Alink's answer .
int NumDigits(int32_t n)
{
if (n < 0) {
if (n == std::numeric_limits<int32_t>::min())
return 11;
return NumDigits(-n) + 1;
}
static int32_t MaxTable[9] = { 10,100,1000,10000,100000,1000000,10000000,100000000,1000000000 };
return 1 + (std::upper_bound(MaxTable, MaxTable+9, n) - MaxTable);
}
Another implementation using STL binary search on a lookup table, which seems not bad (not too long and still faster than division methods). It also seem easy and efficient to adapt for type much bigger than int: will be faster than O(digits) methods and just needs multiplication (no division or log function for this hypothetical type). There is a requirement of a MAXVALUE, though. Unless you fill the table dynamically.
[edit: move the struct into the function]
int NumDigits9(int n) {
struct power10{
vector<int> data;
power10() {
for(int i=10; i < MAX_INT/10; i *= 10) data.push_back(i);
}
};
static const power10 p10;
return 1 + upper_bound(p10.data.begin(), p10.data.end(), n) - p10.data.begin();
}
Since the goal is to be fast, this is a improvement on andrei alexandrescu's improvement. His version was already faster than the naive way (dividing by 10 at every digit). The version below is faster at least on x86-64 and ARM for most sizes.
Benchmarks for this version vs alexandrescu's version on my PR on facebook folly.
inline uint32_t digits10(uint64_t v)
{
std::uint32_t result = 0;
for (;;)
{
result += 1
+ (std::uint32_t)(v>=10)
+ (std::uint32_t)(v>=100)
+ (std::uint32_t)(v>=1000)
+ (std::uint32_t)(v>=10000)
+ (std::uint32_t)(v>=100000);
if (v < 1000000) return result;
v /= 1000000U;
}
}
My version of loop (works with 0, negative and positive values):
int numDigits(int n)
{
int digits = n<0; //count "minus"
do { digits++; } while (n/=10);
return digits;
}
If you're using a version of C++ which include C99 maths functions (C++0x and some earlier compilers)
static const double log10_2 = 3.32192809;
int count_digits ( int n )
{
if ( n == 0 ) return 1;
if ( n < 0 ) return ilogb ( -(double)n ) / log10_2 + 2;
return ilogb ( n ) / log10_2 + 1;
}
Whether ilogb is faster than a loop will depend on the architecture, but it's useful enough for this kind of problem to have been added to the standard.
An optimization of the previous division methods. (BTW they all test if n!=0, but most of the time n>=10 seems enough and spare one division which was more expensive).
I simply use multiplication and it seems to make it much faster (almost 4x here), at least on the 1..100000000 range. I am a bit surprised by such difference, so maybe this triggered some special compiler optimization or I missed something.
The initial change was simple, but unfortunately I needed to take care of a new overflow problem. It makes it less nice, but on my test case, the 10^6 trick more than compensates the cost of the added check. Obviously it depends on input distribution and you can also tweak this 10^6 value.
PS: Of course, this kind of optimization is just for fun :)
int NumDigits(int n) {
int digits = 1;
// reduce n to avoid overflow at the s*=10 step.
// n/=10 was enough but we reuse this to optimize big numbers
if (n >= 1000000) {
n /= 1000000;
digits += 6; // because 1000000 = 10^6
}
int s = 10;
while (s <= n) {
s *= 10;
++digits;
}
return digits;
}