Im trying to write a simple scheme function that returns the last element of a list. My function looks like it should work, but I managed to fail on something:
(define (last_element l)(
(cond (null? (cdr l)) (car l))
(last_element (cdr l))
))
(last_element '(1 2 3)) should return 3
DrRacket keeps on giving me the errors:
mcdr: contract violation
expected: mpair?
given: ()
Since (null? '()) is true, I don't get why this doesn't work.
This is a function I think I will need for a homework assignment (writing the function last-element is not the assignment), and the instructions say that I cannot use the built-in function reverse, so I can't just do (car (reverse l))
How do I fix this function?
Your syntax is totally wrong. You have an extra set of parentheses around the body of the function, not enough around the cond clauses, and your recursive case isn't even within the cond, so it gets done whether the test succeeds or fails. The following procedure should work:
(define (last_element l)
(cond ((null? (cdr l)) (car l))
(else (last_element (cdr l)))))
Just to add: in professional-level Racket, the last function is a part of the racket/list library.
you can retrieve the last element of a list by calling
(define (lastElem list) (car (reverse list)))
or, recursively using if built-in
(define (last list)
(if (zero? (length (cdr list)))
(car list)
(last (cdr list))))
You can also do it like this.First find the lenght of a list by cdring it down.Then use list-ref x which gives the x element of the list.
For example list-ref yourlistsname 0 gives the first element (basically car of the list.)And (list-ref
yourlistsname (- length 1)) gives the last element of the list.
Related
Learning some Scheme/Racket, so give me some leeway.
Currently trying to find the max value when given a list without using the built-in max() function.
Current Code:
#lang racket
(provide max-num)
(define (max-num lst)
(define (helper lst max)
(displayln lst)
(displayln max)
(displayln " ")
(when (null? max) ; first run
(helper (cdr lst) (car lst)))
(if (null? lst)
max ; then end
(if (> (car lst) max) ; else compare
(helper (cdr lst) (car lst)) ; then update max
(helper (cdr lst) max)))) ; else keep max
(if (null? lst)
#f ; then Error
(helper lst '())) ; else run helper
)
(max-num '())
(max-num '(1 5 2 4 3))
Output via DrRacket:
As far as I can tell, the displayln outputs tell me I am on the right track. However, it ends up with a contract violation real? error instead of returning the max value.
I'm guessing that the (if (null? lst)) doesn't want to return "max" at the end and instead pushes towards the else branch despite the list being empty. I've looked around and debugged for about an hour now to no avail. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
You have to know that when you do:
(when test
do-something)
do-something-else
It will always do-something-else regardless if test is true or not. SO what is happening is that the first round max is null? and it does (helper (cdr lst) (car lst))) and that returns the answer. Then it discard that answer and continue to the if with max being null? and it finally fails when it does (> (car lst) max) since a null? is not a number. The error message says it expected a real? but it got the initial value '().
So to hint you on your way you should have one expression in addition to the local definitions eg.
(if test1
result1
(if test2
result2
alternative2))
or
(cond (test1 result1)
(test2 result2)
(else alternative2))
And of course since you know the argument is not null? you could just call (helper (cdr lst) (car lst)) instead of passing the empty list and remove the when entirely. when and unless are for side effects and not really for good functional Scheme style.
I have this scheme function that I'm supposed to run lists of integers on but I have no idea what the error means. The error states: "if: expected a question and two answers, but found 4 parts in: (if(null? list) '() (cons (+ 1 (car list)) (f(cdr list)))). What is missing from this function and what on earth does '() do? Thanks! I've never used Scheme before.
(define (f list)
(if (null? list)
’()
(cons (+ 1 (car list)) (f (cdr list)))))
The character you are using to quote the empty list is the right quotation mark ’, U+2019. Your code works fine if you use the ascii apostrophe ', U+0027
(define (f list)
(if (null? list)
'()
(cons (+ 1 (car list)) (f (cdr list)))))
You used the wrong quote (maybe a copy paste error?).
Use ' not ’.
I am looking for a built-in function in Racket that will return True iff all the items in a list are true.
I tried:
(define (all lst)
(when
(equal? lst '())
#t)
(if (not (car lst))
#f
(all (cdr lst))))
Giving error:
car: contract violation
expected: pair?
given: '()
A couple of testcases:
(all '(#t #f #t)) ; #f
(all '(#t #t #t)) ; #t
Could you please either fix it or point me to the built-in function?
(I googled, but got no meaningful result)
You've already accepted another answer that explains a nice way to do this, but I think it's worth pointing out what was wrong in your attempt, because it was actually very close. The problem is that true from the when block is completely ignored. It doesn't cause the function to return. So even when you have the empty list, you evaluate the when, and then keep on going into the other part where you call car and cdr with the same empty list:
(define (all lst)
(when ; The whole (when ...) expression
(equal? lst '()) ; is evaluated, and then its result
#t) ; is ignored.
(if (not (car lst))
#f
(all (cdr lst))))
A very quick solution would be to change it to:
(define (all lst)
(if (equal? lst '())
#t
(if (not (car lst))
#f
(all (cdr lst)))))
At that point, you can simplify a little bit by using boolean operators rather than returning true and false explicitly, and clean up a little bit by using empty?, as noted in the other answer:
(define (all lst)
(or (empty? lst)
(and (car lst)
(all (cdr lst)))))
You were actually very close at the start.
If you're looking for a builtin solution, you'll probably want to take a look at andmap, which applies a predicate over an entire list and ands the results together.
You could use this to implement all very simply.
(define (all lst)
(andmap identity lst))
By using identity from racket/function, all will just use the values in the list as-is. Instead of using identity explicitly, you could also use values, which is just the identity function on single values, so it's a somewhat common idiom in Racket.
There are two kinds of lists: empty ones and pairs.
Therefore we have the following structure:
(define (all xs)
(cond
[(empty? xs) ...]
[(pair? xs) ...]
[else (error 'all "expected a list, got: " xs)]))
Since all elements in the empty list are true, we get:
(define (all xs)
(cond
[(empty? xs) #t]
[(pair? xs) ...]
[else (error 'all "expected a list, got: " xs)]))
If a list begins with a pair, then all elements of the list are true,
if both the first element of the list and the rest of the elements of the list are true:
(define (all xs)
(cond
[(empty? xs) #t]
[(pair? xs) (and (first xs) (all (rest xs)))]
[else (error 'all "expected a list, got: " xs)]))
Note that part of the problem in your program is the use of when.
The result of
(when #t
'foo)
'bar
is 'bar. The construct when is only useful if you are using side effects (such as caused by set! and friends).
All is a higher order folding function. Scheme refers to these as "reductions" and reduce is available in SRFI-1
In Gauche Scheme:
(use srfi-1)
(define (all list-of-x)
(reduce (lambda (x y)
(and x y))
#t
list-of-x))
Will return #f or a value that evaluates to true. For example:
gosh> (all '(1 2 3))
1
If that's OK, then we're done. Otherwise we can always get #t with:
(use srfi-1)
(define (all-2 list-of-x)
(if (reduce (lambda (x y)
(and x y))
#t
list-of-x)
#t
#f))
And then wind up with:
gosh> (all '(1 2 3))
#t
I'm new to Scheme and this is my very first Functional language. Implementing almost everything recursively seems to be awkward for me. Nevertheless, was able to implement functions of Factorial and Fibonacci problems having a single integer input.
However, what about when your function has an input of a list? Suppose this exercise:
FUNCTION: ret10 - extracts and returns as a list all the numbers greater than 10
that are found in a given list, guile> (ret10 ‘(x e (h n) 1 23 12 o))
OUTPUT: (23 12)
Should I have (define c(list)) as the argument of my function in this? or is there any other way?
Please help. Thanks!
Here's my derived solution based on sir Óscar López's answer below.. hope this helps others:
(define (ret10 lst)
(cond
((null? lst) '())
((and (number? (car lst)) (> (car lst) 10))
(cons (car lst)
(ret10 (cdr lst))))
(else (ret10 (cdr lst)))
)
)
This kind of problem where you receive a list as input and return another list as output has a well-known template for a solution. I'd start by recommending you take a look at The Little Schemer or How to Design Programs, either book will teach you the correct way to start thinking about the solution.
First, I'll show you how to solve a similar problem: copying a list, exactly as it comes. That'll demonstrate the general structure of the solution:
(define (copy lst)
(cond ((null? lst) ; if the input list is empty
'()) ; then return the empty list
(else ; otherwise create a new list
(cons (car lst) ; `cons` the first element
(copy (cdr lst)))))) ; and advance recursion over rest of list
Now let's see how the above relates to your problem. Clearly, the base case for the recursion will be the same. What's different is that we cons the first element with the rest of the list only if it's a number (hint: use the number? procedure) and it's greater than 10. If the condition doesn't hold, we just advance the recursion, without consing anything. Here's the general idea, fill-in the blanks:
(define (ret10 lst)
(cond (<???> <???>) ; base case: empty list
(<???> ; if the condition holds
(cons <???> ; `cons` first element
(ret10 <???>))) ; and advance recursion
(else ; otherwise
(ret10 <???>)))) ; simply advance recursion
Don't forget to test it:
(ret10 '(x e (h n) 1 23 12 o))
=> '(23 12)
As a final note: normally you'd solve this problem using the filter procedure - which takes as input a list and returns as output another list with only the elements that satisfy a given predicate. After you learn and understand how to write a solution "by hand", take a look at filter and write the solution using it, just to compare different approaches.
Solve the problem for the first element of the list and the recurse on rest of the list. Make sure you handle the termination condition (list is null?) and combine results (cons or append in the following)
(define (extract pred? list)
(if (null? list)
'()
(let ((head (car list))
(rest (cdr list)))
(cond ((pred? head) (cons head (extract pred? rest)))
((list? head) (append (extract pred? head)
(extract pred? rest)))
(else (extract pred? rest))))))
(define (ret10 list)
(extract (lambda (x) (and (number? x) (> x 10))) list))
> (ret10 '(0 11 (12 2) 13 3))
(11 12 13)
I am doing a scheme program which takes in a list and then reverse it. So far it works for simple list, which does not contain any sublist, but when I test it for a list contains sublist, it fails. Please help me where is wrong with it.
Here is the code:
(define deep-reverse
(lambda (L)
(cond
((empty? L) '())
(else (append (deep-reverse (rest L)) (list (first L)))))))
(define (deeprev L)
(if (null? L) '()
(if (list? (car L))
(if (chek (car L)) (append (deeprev (cdr L)) (list (reverse (car L))))
(append (deeprev (cdr L)) (list (deeprev (car L)))))
(append (deeprev (cdr L)) (list (car L))))))
First of all, you are using undefined Scheme functions. I am going to work off the following assumptions:
empty? is null?
rest is cdr
first is car
Your code works by taking the first element in a list and adding it to another list. However, that first element of a list can be a list itself. You need to test to see if the element that you're working on is atomic or a list. If it's a list, then you call deep-reverse recursively.
If you would like to see code appended to this, leave a comment.