Players A and B play a game optimally and move alternately. They
start with 1. Each player in his turn multiplies the current number
with any integer from [2,9]. If after a player's turn, the number is
more than or equal to n, he wins.
A starts. Given n, who wins?
For example,
Numbers 2,3..,9 are winning numbers (Player A will win)
Numbers 10,11,..,18 are losing numbers (Player A will lose)
Numbers 19,20,..,162 are winning numbers
What would be the winning strategy? How can the Sprague-Grundy theorem be applied to solve this?
According to Sprague-Grundy theorem each state of an impartial game can be assigned a non-negative integer called Grundy number, such that the player who moves in this state will lose iff this number is 0, and win iff this number is non-zero.
If the Grundy numbers for the states are known, then the winning strategy is to always make a move to a state in which Grundy number is 0.
The algorithm for computing Grundy number for some state of a general game is as follows:
if current player can't make a valid move:
Grundy number := 0 (this player has lost)
else:
for each move in this state:
for each sub-game the game splits into after that move:
compute Grundy number of the sub-game
compute XOR of Grundy numbers of the sub-games
Grundy number := MEX of those XORs
MEX is minimum excludant function. MEX of a set of non-negative integers is equal to the smallest non-negative integer, that does not belong to this set.
For example:
MEX(0) = 1
MEX(0, 1) = 2
MEX(0, 2) = 1
MEX(0, 1, 2) = 3
MEX(0, 1, 3) = 2
MEX(1, 2, 3) = 0
MEX(10, 100, 1000) = 0
Naive implementation of this algorithm for this game in Python 3 may look like this:
import functools
from itertools import count
def mex(s):
for i in count():
if i not in s:
return i
#functools.lru_cache(10000)
def sprague_grundy(n, cur=1):
if cur >= n:
return 0
move_results = {sprague_grundy(n, cur*move) for move in range(2, 9+1)}
return mex(move_results)
for i in count(1):
print(sprague_grundy(i))
Often the easiest way to understand the general formula for the Grundy number is to just look at the sequence and try to notice the relationships.
In this game you can figure out the general formula by simply looking at n numbers for games in which player A wins in inital state, without actually calculating Grundy numbers.
But we can still look at the counts of Grundy numbers of the initial state of the game for consecutive n (0 means player A loses in the initial state, 1,2,3,4 mean player A wins):
$ python3 sprague_grundy.py | uniq -c
1 0
1 1
2 2
4 3
1 4
9 0
18 1
36 2
72 3
18 4
162 0
324 1
648 2
1296 3
324 4
2916 0
It is possible to notice that for player A all the losing initial states are for
Or in other words the initial state for player A is losing iff
Basically you make an array A[] where A[i] stores whether number i is a winning position or losing with respect to the player who starts the game.Let it be player A. Basic rule, from a losing position you can go only to a winning one and a winning position is such that there is always a losing position reachable from it.Following code is explanatory ( 1 means winning w.r.t to A and 0 means losing).
for each i from 1 to 9
A[i]=1
for each i from 10 to n
flag=0
A[i]=0
for each j from 2 to 9
if i is divisible j and A[i/j] is 0
flag=1
if flag is 1
A[i]=1
Now if A[n] is 1 it is winning for him else he loses.
This is an O(n) solution both in time and memory.You can reduce memory, but
time I can't come up with a better solution. There might be a O(1) solution but I am unaware of it.
Related
This the GFG Link
In this link, I am not able to get anything intuition that how we are calculating the number of 2 as a digit in,
My doubt is if we are counting the 6000 digits in the range as explained in the below description then why we are simply dividing the number by 10 and returning it, If anyone can help me, please do post your answer with examples
Case digits < 2
Consider the value x = 61523 and digit at index d = 3 (here indexes are considered from right and rightmost index is 0). We observe that x[d] = 1. There are 2s at the 3rd digit in the ranges 2000 – 2999, 12000 – 12999, 22000 – 22999, 32000 32999, 42000 – 42999, and 52000 – 52999. So there are 6000 2’s total in the 3rd digit. This is the same amount as if we were just counting all the 2s in the 3rd digit between 1 and 60000.
In other words, we can round down to the nearest 10d+1, and then divide by 10, to compute the number of 2s in the d-th digit.
if x[d) < 2: count2sinRangeAtDigit(x, d) =
Compute y = round down to nearest 10d+1
return y/10
Case digit > 2
Now, let’s look at the case where d-th digit (from right) of x is greater than 2 (x[d] > 2). We can apply almost the exact same logic to see that there are the same number of 2s in the 3rd digit in the range 0 – 63525 as there as in the range 0 – 70000. So, rather than rounding down, we round up.
if x[d) > 2: count2sinRangeAtDigit(x, d) =
Compute y = round down to nearest 10d+1
return y / 10
Case digit = 2
The final case may be the trickiest, but it follows from the earlier logic. Consider x = 62523 and d = 3. We know that there are the same ranges of 2s from before (that is, the ranges 2000 – 2999, 12000 – 12999, … , 52000 – 52999). How many appear in the 3rd digit in the final, partial range from 62000 – 62523? Well, that should be pretty easy. It’s just 524 (62000, 62001, … , 62523).
if x[d] = 2: count2sinRangeAtDigit(x, d) =
Compute y = round down to nearest 10d+1
Compute z = right side of x (i.e., x% 10d)
return y/10 + z + 1**// here why we are doing it ,what is the logic behind this approach**
There is not complete clarity in the explantion given above that's why I am asking here Thank you
For me that explanation is strange too. Also note that true complexity is O(log(n)) because it depends on nummber length (digit count).
Consider the next example: we have number 6125.
At the first round we need to calculate how many 2's are met as the rightmost digit in all numbers from 0 to 6125. We round number down to 6120 and up to 6130. Last digit is 5>2, so we have 613 intervals, every interval contains one digit 2 as the last digit - here we count last 2's in numbers like 2,12,22,..1352,..,6122.
At the second round we need to calculate how many 2's are met as the second (from right) digit in all numbers from 0 to 6125. We round number down to 6100 and up to 6200. Also we have right=5. Digit is 2, so we have 61 intervals, every interval contains ten digits 2 at the second place (20..29, 120..129... 6020..6029). We add 61*10. Also we have to add 5+1 2's for values 6120..6125
At the third round we need to calculate how many 2's are met as the third (from right) digit in all numbers from 0 to 6125. We round number down to 6000 and up to 7000. Digit is 1, so we have 6 intervals, every interval contains one hundred of digit 2 at the third place (200.299.. 5200..5299). So add 6*100.
I think it is clear now that we add 1 interval with thousand of 2's (2000.2999) as the leftmost digit (6>2)
Thor is playing a game where there are N levels and M types of available weapons. The levels are numbered from 0 to N-1 and the weapons are numbered from 0 to M-1. He can clear these levels in any order. In each level, some subset of these M weapons is required to clear this level. If in a particular level, he needs to buy x new weapons, he will pay x^2 coins for it. Also note that he can carry all the weapons he has currently to the next level. Initially, he has no weapons. Can you find out the minimum coins required such that he can clear all the levels?
Input Format
The first line of input contains 2 space separated integers:
N = the number of levels in the game
M = the number of types of weapons
N lines follow. The ith of these lines contains a binary string of length M. If the jth character of this string is 1, it means we need a weapon of type j to clear the ith level.
Constraints
1 <= N <= 20
1 <= M <= 20
Output Format
Print a single integer which is the answer to the problem.
Sample TestCase 1
Input
1 4
0101
Output
4
Explanation
There is only one level in this game. We need 2 types of weapons - 1 and 3. Since, initially, Thor has no weapons he will have to buy these, which will cost him 2^2 = 4 coins.
Sample TestCase 2
Input
3 3
111
001
010
Output
3
Explanation
There are 3 levels in this game. The 0th level (111) requires all 3 types of weapons. The 1st level (001) requires only weapon of type 2. The 2nd level requires only weapon of type 1. If we clear the levels in the given order (0-1-2), total cost = 3^2 + 0^2 + 0^2 = 9 coins. If we clear the levels in the order 1-2-0, it will cost = 1^2 + 1^2 + 1^2 = 3 coins, which is the optimal way.
The beauty of Gassa's answer is partly in the fact that if a different state can be reached by oring one of the levels' bitstring masks with the current state, we are guaranteed that achieving the current state did not include visiting this level (since otherwise those bits would already be set). This means checking a transition from one state to another by adding a different bitmask, guarantees we are looking at an ordering that did not yet include that mask. So a formulation like Gassa's could work: let f(st) represent the cost of acheiving state st, then:
f(st) = min(
some known cost of f(st),
f(prev_st) + (popcount(prev_st | level) - popcount(prev_st))^2
)
for all level and prev_st that or to st
I am searching for a method to create, in a fast way a random matrix A with the follwing properties:
A = transpose(A)
A(i,i) = 0 for all i
A(i,j) >= 0 for all i, j
sum(A) =~ degree; the sum of rows are randomly distributed by a distribution I want to specify (here =~ means approximate equality).
The distribution degree comes from a matrix orig, specifically degree=sum(orig), thus I know that matrices with this distribution exist.
For example: orig=[0 12 7 5; 12 0 1 9; 7 1 0 3; 5 9 3 0]
orig =
0 12 7 5
12 0 1 9
7 1 0 3
5 9 3 0
sum(orig)=[24 22 11 17];
Now one possible matrix A=[0 11 5 8, 11 0 4 7, 5 4 0 2, 8 7 2 0] is
A =
0 11 5 8
11 0 4 7
5 4 0 2
8 7 2 0
with sum(A)=[24 22 11 17].
I am trying this for quite some time, but unfortunatly my two ideas didn't work:
version 1:
I switch Nswitch times two random elements: A(k1,k3)--; A(k1,k4)++; A(k2,k3)++; A(k2,k4)--; (the transposed elements aswell).
Unfortunatly, Nswitch = log(E)*E (with E=sum(sum(nn))) in order that the Matrices are very uncorrelated. As my E > 5.000.000, this is not feasible (in particular, as I need at least 10 of such matrices).
version 2:
I create the matrix according to the distribution from scratch. The idea is, to fill every row i with degree(i) numbers, based on the distribution of degree:
nn=orig;
nnR=zeros(size(nn));
for i=1:length(nn)
degree=sum(nn);
howmany=degree(i);
degree(i)=0;
full=rld_cumsum(degree,1:length(degree));
rr=randi(length(full),[1,howmany]);
ff=full(rr);
xx=i*ones([1,length(ff)]);
nnR = nnR + accumarray([xx(:),ff(:)],1,size(nnR));
end
A=nnR;
However, while sum(A')=degree, sum(A) systematically deviates from degree, and I am not able to find the reason for that.
Small deviations from degree are fine of course, but there seem to be systmatical deviations in particulat of the matrices contain in some places large numbers.
I would be very happy if somebody could either show me a fast method for version1, or a reason for the systematic deviation of the distribution in version 2, or a method to create such matrices in a different way. Thank you!
Edit:
This is the problem in matsmath's proposed solution:
Imagine you have the matrix:
orig =
0 12 3 1
12 0 1 9
3 1 0 3
1 9 3 0
with r(i)=[16 22 7 13].
Step 1: r(1)=16, my random integer partition is p(i)=[0 7 3 6].
Step 2: Check that all p(i)<=r(i), which is the case.
Step 3:
My random matrix starts looks like
A =
0 7 3 6
7 0 . .
3 . 0 .
6 . . 0
with the new row sum vector rnew=[r(2)-p(2),...,r(n)-p(n)]=[15 4 7]
Second iteration (here the problem occures):
Step 1: rnew(1)=15, my random integer partition is p(i)=[0 A B]: rnew(1)=15=A+B.
Step 2: Check that all p(i)<=rnew(i), which gives A<=4, B<=7. So A+B<=11, but A+B has to be 15. contradiction :-/
Edit2:
This is the code representing (to the best of my knowledge) the solution posted by David Eisenstat:
orig=[0 12 3 1; 12 0 1 9; 3 1 0 3; 1 9 3 0];
w=[2.2406 4.6334 0.8174 1.6902];
xfull=zeros(4);
for ii=1:1000
rndmat=[poissrnd(w(1),1,4); poissrnd(w(2),1,4); poissrnd(w(3),1,4); poissrnd(w(4),1,4)];
kkk=rndmat.*(ones(4)-eye(4)); % remove diagonal
hhh=sum(sum(orig))/sum(sum(kkk))*kkk; % normalisation
xfull=xfull+hhh;
end
xf=xfull/ii;
disp(sum(orig)); % gives [16 22 7 13]
disp(sum(xf)); % gives [14.8337 9.6171 18.0627 15.4865] (obvious systematic problem)
disp(sum(xf')) % gives [13.5230 28.8452 4.9635 10.6683] (which is also systematically different from [16, 22, 7, 13]
Since it's enough to approximately preserve the degree sequence, let me propose a random distribution where each entry above the diagonal is chosen according to a Poisson distribution. My intuition is that we want to find weights w_i such that the i,j entry for i != j has mean w_i*w_j (all of the diagonal entries are zero). This gives us a nonlinear system of equations:
for all i, (sum_{j != i} w_i*w_j) = d_i,
where d_i is the degree of i. Equivalently,
for all i, w_i * (sum_j w_j) - w_i^2 = d_i.
The latter can be solved by applying Newton's method as described below from a starting solution of w_i = d_i / sqrt(sum_j d_j).
Once we have the w_is, we can sample repeatedly using poissrnd to generate samples of multiple Poisson distributions at once.
(If I have time, I'll try implementing this in numpy.)
The Jacobian matrix of the equation system for a 4 by 4 problem is
(w_2 + w_3 + w_4) w_1 w_1 w_1
w_2 (w_1 + w_3 + w_4) w_2 w_2
w_3 w_3 (w_1 + w_2 + w_4) w_3
w_4 w_4 w_4 (w_1 + w_2 + w_3).
In general, let A be a diagonal matrix where A_{i,i} = sum_j w_j - 2*w_i. Let u = [w_1, ..., w_n]' and v = [1, ..., 1]'. The Jacobian can be written J = A + u*v'. The inverse is given by the Sherman--Morrison formula
A^-1*u*v'*A^-1
J^-1 = (A + u*v')^-1 = A^-1 - -------------- .
1 + v'*A^-1*u
For the Newton step, we need to compute J^-1*y for some given y. This can be done straightforwardly in time O(n) using the above equation. I'll add more detail when I get the chance.
First approach (based on version2)
Let your row sum vector given by the matrix orig [r(1),r(2),...,r(n)].
Step 1. Take a random integer partition of the integer r(1) into exactly n-1 parts, say p(2), p(3), ..., p(n)
Step 2. Check if p(i)<=r(i) for all i=2...n. If not, go to Step 1.
Step 3. Fill out your random matrix first row and colum by the entries 0, p(2), ... , p(n), and consider the new row sum vector [r(2)-p(2),...,r(n)-p(n)].
Repeat these steps with a matrix of order n-1.
The point is, that you randomize one row at a time, and reduce the problem to searching for a matrix of size one less.
As pointed out by OP in the comment, this naive algorithm fails. The reason is that the matrices in question have a further necessary condition on their entries as follows:
FACT:
If A is an orig matrix with row sums [r(1), r(2), ..., r(n)] then necessarily for every i=1..n it holds that r(i)<=-r(i)+sum(r(j),j=1..n).
That is, any row sum, say the ith, r(i), is necessarily at most as big as the sum of the other row sums (not including r(i)).
In light of this, a revised algorithm is possible. Note that in Step 2b. we check if the new row sum vector has the property discussed above.
Step 1. Take a random integer partition of the integer r(1) into exactly n-1 parts, say p(2), p(3), ..., p(n)
Step 2a. Check if p(i)<=r(i) for all i=2...n. If not, go to Step 1.
Step 2b. Check if r(i)-p(i)<=-r(i)+p(i)+sum(r(j)-p(j),j=2..n) for all i=2..n. If not, go to Step 1.
Step 3. Fill out your random matrix first row and colum by the entries 0, p(2), ... , p(n), and consider the new row sum vector [r(2)-p(2),...,r(n)-p(n)].
Second approach (based on version1)
I am not sure if this approach gives you random matrices, but it certainly gives you different matrices.
The idea here is to change some parts of your orig matrix locally, in a way which maintains all of its properties.
You should look for a random 2x2 submatrix below the main diagonal which contains strictly positive entries, like [[a,b],[c,d]] and perturbe its contents by a random value r to [[a+r,b-r],[c-r,d+r]]. You make the same change above the main diagonal too, to keep your new matrix symmetric. Here the point is that the changes within the entries "cancel" each other out.
Of course, r should be chosen in a way such that b-r>=0 and c-r>=0.
You can pursue this idea to modify larger submatrices too. For example, you might choose 3 random row coordinates r1, r2, r2 and 3 random column coordinates c1, c2, and c3 and then make changes in your orig matrix at the 9 positions (ri,cj) as follows: you change your 3x3 submatrix [[a b c],[d e f], [g h i]] to [[a-r b+r c] [d+r e f-r], [g h-r i+r]]. You do the same at the transposed places. Again, the random value r must be chosen in a way so that a-r>=0 and f-r>=0 and h-r>=0. Moreover, c1 and r1, and c3 and r3 must be distinct as you can't change the 0 entries in the main diagonal of the matrix orig.
You can repeat such things over and over again, say 100 times, until you find something which looks random. Note that this idea uses the fact that you have existing knowledge of a solution, this is the matrix orig, while the first approach does not use such knowledge at all.
You start with a stack of n sticks. Each player removes 2 or 3 sticks each turn. The player who removes the last stick wins. If their is only one stick left, the game is a draw.
I need to determine who will win a game of n stacks in general, expressed as a function of n. However, unless we start the game with 2, 3 or 5 sticks, it is always possible to direct the game so that it ends in a draw. I drew the game tree for 9 sticks and more and it is always possible to prevent a loss by making choices that lead to one stick remaining. How can I write a winning rule for this given problem?
However, unless we start the game with 2, 3 or 5 sticks, it is always possible to direct the game so that it ends in a draw.
I don't think this is true.
For example, suppose we start with 10 sticks. If you remove x sticks, I will always remove 5-x sticks. This will mean that after one turn each there are 5 sticks left, and after two turns each I have won.
The same will apply for any multiple of 5.
Now consider other possible values modulo 5.
Here's the rule:
Losing Position: n = 5k
Draw: n = 5k+1 or n = 5k+4
Winning Position: n = 5k+2 or n = 5k+3
You can observe the pattern by building a table like the one shown below:
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 .....
L D W W D L D W W D L D W W D L D
Steps for Building the table:
Observe that you lose if n = 0, mark it as L.
When n = 1, it is draw, mark it as D.
When n = 2, you can only draw 2 sticks. So, your opponent happens to face n=0 which is losing, so you win, mark it as W.
For n = 3, you can take 2 or 3 sticks, so, your opponent can end up at 1 or 0 sticks. 1 is a draw and 0 is loss for him and therefore win for us. So, we will chose win, mark it as W.
For n=4, similarily, opponent can end up at 2 or 1. So, we can draw or lose. We will choose draw, mark it as D.
For n = 5, we can either make our opponent end up at 2 or 3. Both of them are win for him. So, we lose. Mark it as L.
Basically, to determine the state(L, W or D) of a number n, we need to look at states of already computed states n-2 and n-3.
Observe that this pattern (LDWWD) repeats after that.
given a sorted array of distinct integers, what is the minimum number of steps required to make the integers contiguous? Here the condition is that: in a step , only one element can be changed and can be either increased or decreased by 1 . For example, if we have 2,4,5,6 then '2' can be made '3' thus making the elements contiguous(3,4,5,6) .Hence the minimum steps here is 1 . Similarly for the array: 2,4,5,8:
Step 1: '2' can be made '3'
Step 2: '8' can be made '7'
Step 3: '7' can be made '6'
Thus the sequence now is 3,4,5,6 and the number of steps is 3.
I tried as follows but am not sure if its correct?
//n is the number of elements in array a
int count=a[n-1]-a[0]-1;
for(i=1;i<=n-2;i++)
{
count--;
}
printf("%d\n",count);
Thanks.
The intuitive guess is that the "center" of the optimal sequence will be the arithmetic average, but this is not the case. Let's find the correct solution with some vector math:
Part 1: Assuming the first number is to be left alone (we'll deal with this assumption later), calculate the differences, so 1 12 3 14 5 16-1 2 3 4 5 6 would yield 0 -10 0 -10 0 -10.
sidenote: Notice that a "contiguous" array by your implied definition would be an increasing arithmetic sequence with difference 1. (Note that there are other reasonable interpretations of your question: some people may consider 5 4 3 2 1 to be contiguous, or 5 3 1 to be contiguous, or 1 2 3 2 3 to be contiguous. You also did not specify if negative numbers should be treated any differently.)
theorem: The contiguous numbers must lie between the minimum and maximum number. [proof left to reader]
Part 2: Now returning to our example, assuming we took the 30 steps (sum(abs(0 -10 0 -10 0 -10))=30) required to turn 1 12 3 14 5 16 into 1 2 3 4 5 6. This is one correct answer. But 0 -10 0 -10 0 -10+c is also an answer which yields an arithmetic sequence of difference 1, for any constant c. In order to minimize the number of "steps", we must pick an appropriate c. In this case, each time we increase or decrease c, we increase the number of steps by N=6 (the length of the vector). So for example if we wanted to turn our original sequence 1 12 3 14 5 16 into 3 4 5 6 7 8 (c=2), then the differences would have been 2 -8 2 -8 2 -8, and sum(abs(2 -8 2 -8 2 -8))=30.
Now this is very clear if you could picture it visually, but it's sort of hard to type out in text. First we took our difference vector. Imagine you drew it like so:
4|
3| *
2| * |
1| | | *
0+--+--+--+--+--*
-1| |
-2| *
We are free to "shift" this vector up and down by adding or subtracting 1 from everything. (This is equivalent to finding c.) We wish to find the shift which minimizes the number of | you see (the area between the curve and the x-axis). This is NOT the average (that would be minimizing the standard deviation or RMS error, not the absolute error). To find the minimizing c, let's think of this as a function and consider its derivative. If the differences are all far away from the x-axis (we're trying to make 101 112 103 114 105 116), it makes sense to just not add this extra stuff, so we shift the function down towards the x-axis. Each time we decrease c, we improve the solution by 6. Now suppose that one of the *s passes the x axis. Each time we decrease c, we improve the solution by 5-1=4 (we save 5 steps of work, but have to do 1 extra step of work for the * below the x-axis). Eventually when HALF the *s are past the x-axis, we can NO LONGER IMPROVE THE SOLUTION (derivative: 3-3=0). (In fact soon we begin to make the solution worse, and can never make it better again. Not only have we found the minimum of this function, but we can see it is a global minimum.)
Thus the solution is as follows: Pretend the first number is in place. Calculate the vector of differences. Minimize the sum of the absolute value of this vector; do this by finding the median OF THE DIFFERENCES and subtracting that off from the differences to obtain an improved differences-vector. The sum of the absolute value of the "improved" vector is your answer. This is O(N) The solutions of equal optimality will (as per the above) always be "adjacent". A unique solution exists only if there are an odd number of numbers; otherwise if there are an even number of numbers, AND the median-of-differences is not an integer, the equally-optimal solutions will have difference-vectors with corrective factors of any number between the two medians.
So I guess this wouldn't be complete without a final example.
input: 2 3 4 10 14 14 15 100
difference vector: 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9-2 3 4 10 14 14 15 100 = 0 0 0 -5 -8 -7 -7 -91
note that the medians of the difference-vector are not in the middle anymore, we need to perform an O(N) median-finding algorithm to extract them...
medians of difference-vector are -5 and -7
let us take -5 to be our correction factor (any number between the medians, such as -6 or -7, would also be a valid choice)
thus our new goal is 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9+5=7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14, and the new differences are 5 5 5 0 -3 -2 -2 -86*
this means we will need to do 5+5+5+0+3+2+2+86=108 steps
*(we obtain this by repeating step 2 with our new target, or by adding 5 to each number of the previous difference... but since you only care about the sum, we'd just add 8*5 (vector length times correct factor) to the previously calculated sum)
Alternatively, we could have also taken -6 or -7 to be our correction factor. Let's say we took -7...
then the new goal would have been 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9+7=9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16, and the new differences would have been 7 7 7 2 1 0 0 -84
this would have meant we'd need to do 7+7+7+2+1+0+0+84=108 steps, the same as above
If you simulate this yourself, can see the number of steps becomes >108 as we take offsets further away from the range [-5,-7].
Pseudocode:
def minSteps(array A of size N):
A' = [0,1,...,N-1]
diffs = A'-A
medianOfDiffs = leftMedian(diffs)
return sum(abs(diffs-medianOfDiffs))
Python:
leftMedian = lambda x:sorted(x)[len(x)//2]
def minSteps(array):
target = range(len(array))
diffs = [t-a for t,a in zip(target,array)]
medianOfDiffs = leftMedian(diffs)
return sum(abs(d-medianOfDiffs) for d in diffs)
edit:
It turns out that for arrays of distinct integers, this is equivalent to a simpler solution: picking one of the (up to 2) medians, assuming it doesn't move, and moving other numbers accordingly. This simpler method often gives incorrect answers if you have any duplicates, but the OP didn't ask that, so that would be a simpler and more elegant solution. Additionally we can use the proof I've given in this solution to justify the "assume the median doesn't move" solution as follows: the corrective factor will always be in the center of the array (i.e. the median of the differences will be from the median of the numbers). Thus any restriction which also guarantees this can be used to create variations of this brainteaser.
Get one of the medians of all the numbers. As the numbers are already sorted, this shouldn't be a big deal. Assume that median does not move. Then compute the total cost of moving all the numbers accordingly. This should give the answer.
community edit:
def minSteps(a):
"""INPUT: list of sorted unique integers"""
oneMedian = a[floor(n/2)]
aTarget = [oneMedian + (i-floor(n/2)) for i in range(len(a))]
# aTargets looks roughly like [m-n/2?, ..., m-1, m, m+1, ..., m+n/2]
return sum(abs(aTarget[i]-a[i]) for i in range(len(a)))
This is probably not an ideal solution, but a first idea.
Given a sorted sequence [x1, x2, …, xn]:
Write a function that returns the differences of an element to the previous and to the next element, i.e. (xn – xn–1, xn+1 – xn).
If the difference to the previous element is > 1, you would have to increase all previous elements by xn – xn–1 – 1. That is, the number of necessary steps would increase by the number of previous elements × (xn – xn–1 – 1). Let's call this number a.
If the difference to the next element is >1, you would have to decrease all subsequent elements by xn+1 – xn – 1. That is, the number of necessary steps would increase by the number of subsequent elements × (xn+1 – xn – 1). Let's call this number b.
If a < b, then increase all previous elements until they are contiguous to the current element. If a > b, then decrease all subsequent elements until they are contiguous to the current element. If a = b, it doesn't matter which of these two actions is chosen.
Add up the number of steps taken in the previous step (by increasing the total number of necessary steps by either a or b), and repeat until all elements are contiguous.
First of all, imagine that we pick an arbitrary target of contiguous increasing values and then calculate the cost (number of steps required) for modifying the array the array to match.
Original: 3 5 7 8 10 16
Target: 4 5 6 7 8 9
Difference: +1 0 -1 -1 -2 -7 -> Cost = 12
Sign: + 0 - - - -
Because the input array is already ordered and distinct, it is strictly increasing. Because of this, it can be shown that the differences will always be non-increasing.
If we change the target by increasing it by 1, the cost will change. Each position in which the difference is currently positive or zero will incur an increase in cost by 1. Each position in which the difference is currently negative will yield a decrease in cost by 1:
Original: 3 5 7 8 10 16
New target: 5 6 7 8 9 10
New Difference: +2 +1 0 0 -1 -6 -> Cost = 10 (decrease by 2)
Conversely, if we decrease the target by 1, each position in which the difference is currently positive will yield a decrease in cost by 1, while each position in which the difference is zero or negative will incur an increase in cost by 1:
Original: 3 5 7 8 10 16
New target: 3 4 5 6 7 8
New Difference: 0 -1 -2 -2 -3 -8 -> Cost = 16 (increase by 4)
In order to find the optimal values for the target array, we must find a target such that any change (increment or decrement) will not decrease the cost. Note that an increment of the target can only decrease the cost when there are more positions with negative difference than there are with zero or positive difference. A decrement can only decrease the cost when there are more positions with a positive difference than with a zero or negative difference.
Here are some example distributions of difference signs. Remember that the differences array is non-increasing, so positives always have to be first and negatives last:
C C
+ + + - - - optimal
+ + 0 - - - optimal
0 0 0 - - - optimal
+ 0 - - - - can increment (negatives exceed positives & zeroes)
+ + + 0 0 0 optimal
+ + + + - - can decrement (positives exceed negatives & zeroes)
+ + 0 0 - - optimal
+ 0 0 0 0 0 optimal
C C
Observe that if one of the central elements (marked C) is zero, the target must be optimal. In such a circumstance, at best any increment or decrement will not change the cost, but it may increase it. This result is important, because it gives us a trivial solution. We pick a target such that a[n/2] remains unchanged. There may be other possible targets that yield the same cost, but there are definitely none that are better. Here's the original code modified to calculate this cost:
//n is the number of elements in array a
int targetValue;
int cost = 0;
int middle = n / 2;
int startValue = a[middle] - middle;
for (i = 0; i < n; i++)
{
targetValue = startValue + i;
cost += abs(targetValue - a[i]);
}
printf("%d\n",cost);
You can not do it by iterating once on the array, that's for sure.
You need first to check the difference between each two numbers, for example:
2,7,8,9 can be 2,3,4,5 with 18 steps or 6,7,8,9 with 4 steps.
Create a new array with the difference like so: for 2,7,8,9 it wiil be 4,1,1. Now you can decide whether to increase or decrease the first number.
Lets assume that the contiguous array looks something like this -
c c+1 c+2 c+3 .. and so on
Now lets take an example -
5 7 8 10
The contiguous array in this case will be -
c c+1 c+2 c+3
In order to get the minimum steps, the sum of the modulus of the difference of the integers(before and after) w.r.t the ith index should be the minimum. In which case,
(c-5)^2 + (c-6)^2 + (c-6)^2 + (c-7)^2 should be minimum
Let f(c) = (c-5)^2 + (c-6)^2 + (c-6)^2 + (c-7)^2
= 4c^2 - 48c + 146
Applying differential calculus to get the minima,
f'(c) = 8c - 48 = 0
=> c = 6
So our contiguous array is 6 7 8 9 and the minimum cost here is 2.
To sum it up, just generate f(c), get the first differential and find out c.
This should take O(n).
Brute force approach O(N*M)
If one draws a line through each point in the array a then y0 is a value where each line starts at index 0. Then the answer is the minimum among number of steps reqired to get from a to every line that starts at y0, in Python:
y0s = set((y - i) for i, y in enumerate(a))
nsteps = min(sum(abs(y-(y0+i)) for i, y in enumerate(a))
for y0 in xrange(min(y0s), max(y0s)+1)))
Input
2,4,5,6
2,4,5,8
Output
1
3