Sieve of Erathostenes.. find primes in range. How to get starting point? - primes

**NOTE: This is related to a college assignment. I'm only requesting some guidance in the right direction.
I have a single threaded solution to find prime numbers (Homework is to convert to multi threaded solution). It currently says to start off with the list of numbers to be checked. Starting with the first prime, 2. (for 0...N).
I want to be able to divide up the list (0...N) to something like (0...25), (26...50), (51...75) and (76...100).
If the starting point for each list is the first prime. How do I find it? Must I have a seperate function to get that?
Thanks.

I take it that you want a multi-threaded implementation. You don't need each list to start with a prime. (That would actually be a bit circular, considering what you're trying to compute.) Think of a group of workers, each with a list. Rather than have each worker work in isolation, think of broadcasting the current prime against which to sieve and have each worker go off and apply it to that worker's list. Wait until every worker reports completion of that phase, find the next prime, and repeat.

To add multithreading, I would just use a variable to keep track of what number the sieve is up to, and start a thread to remove the multiples of those numbers.
int a = 2;
//run thread 1
while(sieve[a] == false)
a++;
//run thread 2
//etc.
Obviously there's a little more to it.. but this is the general idea.

Related

Riddle puzzle in clingo

So in the tag prolog someone wanted to solve the "the giant cat army riddle" by Dan Finkel (see video / Link for description of the puzzle).
Since I want to improve in answer set programming I hereby challenge you to solve the puzzle more efficient than me. You will find my solution as answer. I'll accept the fastest running answer (except if it's using dirty hacks).
Rules:
hardcoding the length of the list (or something similar) counts as dirty hack.
The output has to be in the predicate r/2, where it's first argument is the index of the list and the second its entry.
Time measured is for the first valid answer.
num(0..59).
%valid operation pairs
op(N*N,N):- N=2..7.
% no need to add operations that start with 14
op(Ori,New):- num(Ori), New = Ori+7, num(New), Ori!=14.
op(Ori,New):- num(Ori), New = Ori+5, num(New), Ori!=14.
%iteratively create new numbers from old numbers
l(0,0).
{l(T+1,New) : op(Old,New)} = 1 :- l(T,Old), num(T+1), op(Old,_).
%no number twice
:- 2 #sum {1,T : l(T,Value)}, num(Value).
%2 before 10 before 14
%linear encoding
reached(T,10) :- l(T,10).
reached(T+1,10) :- reached(T,10), num(T+1).
:- reached(T,10), l(T,2).
:- l(T,14), l(T+1,_).
%looks nicer, but quadratic
%:- l(T2,2), l(T10,10), T10<T2.
%:- l(T14,14), l(T10,10), T14<T10.
%we must have these three numbers in the list somewhere
:- not l(_,2).
:- not l(_,10).
:- not l(_,14).
#show r(T,V) : l(T,V).
#show.
Having a slightly more ugly encoding improves grounding a lot (which was your main problem).
I restricted op/2 to not start with 14, as this should be the last element in the list
I do create the list iteratively, this may not be as nice, but at least for the start of the list it already removed impossible to reach values via grounding. So you will never have l(1,33) or l(2,45) etc...
Also list generation stops when reaching the value 14, as no more operation is possible/needed.
I also added a linear scaling version of the "before" section, although it is not really necessary for this short list (but a cool trick in general if you have long lists!) This is called "chaining".
Also note that your show statement is non-trivial and does create some constraints/variables.
I hope this helps, otherwise feel free to ask such questions also on our potassco mailing list ;)
My first attempt is to generate a permutation of numbers and force successor elements to be connected by one of the 3 operations (+5, +7 or sqrt). I predefine the operations to avoid choosing/counting problems. Testing for <60 is not necessary since the output of an operation has to be a number between 0 and 59. The generated List l/2 is forwarded to the output r/2 until the number 14 appears. I guess there is plenty of room to outrun my solution.
num(0..59).
%valid operation pairs
op(N*N,N):- N=2..7.
op(Ori,New):- num(Ori), New = Ori+7, num(New).
op(Ori,New):- num(Ori), New = Ori+5, num(New).
%for each position one number
l(0,0).
{l(T,N):num(N)}==1:-num(T).
{l(T,N):num(T)}==1:-num(N).
% following numbers are connected with an operation until 14
:- l(T,Ori), not op(Ori,New), l(T+1,New), l(End,14), T+1<=End.
% 2 before 10 before 14
:- l(T2,2), l(T10,10), T10<T2.
:- l(T14,14), l(T10,10), T14<T10.
% output
r(T,E):- l(T,E), l(End,14), T<=End.
#show r/2.
first Answer:
r(0,0) r(1,5) r(2,12) r(3,19) r(4,26) r(5,31) r(6,36) r(7,6)
r(8,11) r(9,16) r(10,4) r(11,2) r(12,9) r(13,3) r(14,10) r(15,15)
r(16,20) r(17,25) r(18,30) r(19,37) r(20,42) r(21,49) r(22,7) r(23,14)
There are multiple possible lists with different length.

Python, getting a centered average with a catch

So, my assignment is to get the centered average of a list, much like a few of the other posts on here like this one (https://codereview.stackexchange.com/questions/108404/how-to-get-a-centered-mean-excluding-max-and-min-value-of-a-list-in-python) and a few others. However, my professor has told us we are not allowed to use min, max, or sort to solve this. So what I have right now is this, it is still a work in progress:
def centered_average(nums):
high=0
low=0
a=0
b=0
for i in range(len(nums)):
if nums[i]>a:
a=nums[i]
high=a
for i in range(len(nums)):
if nums[i]<b:
b=nums[i]
low=b
total=sum(nums)
average=(total-high-low)/(len(nums)-2)
print(average)
My problem is that I can't get low to be recognized as the lowest number in the list. For example, if I input [1,2,3,4,5] as the list, my function should return 5 as the high, 1 as the low, and 3 as the centered average since 2+3+4 is 9/3=3. However, what I have right there returns the low as 0. I think it is because of the (lens(nums) since it would think the first number is a 0. I'm not sure how I should fix this.
Note: I am still a beginner at this stuff so I know what I have might not be the best or that the error could be simple to fix, but I am still in the process of learning so any help and advice would be much appreciated.
The problem is your starting the running minimum (and running maximum) as 0.
Start the running minimum as float("inf") (as everything is guaranteed to be less than that). Start the running maximum as float("-inf") (as everything is guaranteed to be greater than that).
Or, start both as the first element of the list (which is either a true minimum/maximum, or there's another element that is lower/higher than it).

power function and arrays in c++

I'm trying to write a function that will take an array or vector and have its values taken to a "power of" and then display it's values. I'm not too familiar with arrays but simply put I'm trying to create something like
n = {2^1, 3^1, 5^1,2^2,3^2,5^2,....}
the "power of" is going to be looped.
I then plan to sort the array, and display 1500th term.
this problem corresponds to prime number sequence only divisible by 2 , 3 & 5;
I'm trying to find a more time efficient way than just if statements and mod operators.
If I remember correctly this is the Ugly Numbers problem I've faced some years ago in the UVa.
The idea to solve this problem is to use a priority queue with the numbers 2, 3 and 5 as initial values. At each step remove the topmost value t and insert the values 2*t, 3*t and 5*t in the priority queue, repeat this steps till the 1500th term is found.
See this forum for more info: http://online-judge.uva.es/board/viewtopic.php?t=93

The New Villa Acm solution strategy

I am trying to solve this ACM problem The New Villa
and i am not figuring out how to approach this problem definitely its graph problem but doors and the room that have switches to other rooms are very confusing to make a generic solution. Can some body help me in defining the strategy for this problem.
Also i want some discussion forum for ACM problems if you know any one then please share.
Thanks
A.S
It seems like a pathfinding problem on states.
You can represent each vertex with a binary vector of size n + an indentifier - where which room you are in at the moment [n is the number of rooms].
G=(V,E) where V = {all binary vectors of size n and a recored for which room you are in} and E = {(u,v) | you can switch from binary vector u to v by clicking a button in the room you are in, or move to adjacent lights on room }
Now you only need to run a search algorithm on the possible paths.
Possible search algorithms:
BFS - simplest to program, though slowest run time
bi - directional BFS - since there is only one target node,
a bi-directional search will work here, it is expected to be much
faster then BFS
A* - find an admissible heurstic function and run
informed A* on the problem. It is harder to program it then the rest - but if you find a good heurisitc, it will most likely perform much better.
(*) All of the above are both complete [will find a solution if one exists] and optimal [will find the shortest solution, if one exists]
(*) This solution runs in exponential time on the number of rooms, but it should end up for d <= 10 as indicated in the problem in reasonable time.

C++ pathfinding with a-star, optimization

Im wondering if I can optimize my pathfinding code a bit, lets look at this map:
+ - wall, . - free, S - start, F - finish
.S.............
...............
..........+++..
..........+F+..
..........+++..
...............
The human will look at it and say its impossible, becouse finish is surrounded... But A-star MUST check all fields to ascertain, that there isnt possible road. Well, its not a problem with small maps. But when I have 256x265 map, it takes a lot of time to check all points. I think that i can stop searching while there are closed nodes arround the finish, i mean:
+ - wall, . - free, S - start, F - finish, X - closed node
.S.............
.........XXXXX.
.........X+++X.
.........X+F+X.
.........X+++X.
.........XXXXX.
And I want to finish in this situation (There is no entrance to "room" with finish). I thought to check h, and while none of open nodes is getting closer, then to finish... But im not sure if its ok, maybe there is any better way?
Thanx for any replies.
First of all this problem is better solved with breadth-first search, but I will assume you have a good reason to use a-star instead. However I still recommend you first check the connectivity between S and F with some kind of search(Breadth-first or depth-first search). This will solve our issue.
Assuming the map doesn't change, you can preprocess it by dividing it to connected components. It can be done with a fast disjoint set data structure. Then before launching A* you check in constant time that the source and destination belong to the same component. If not—no path exists, otherwie you run A* to find the path.
The downside is that you will need additional n-bits per cell where n = ceil(log C) for C being the number of connected components. If you have enough memory and can afford it then it's OK.
Edit: in case you fix n being small (e.g. one byte) and have more than that number of components (e.g. more than 256 for 8-bit n) then you can assign the same number to multiple components. To achieve best results make sure each component-id has nearly the same number of cells assigned to it.