I'm trying to create my own implementation of a puzzle game.
To create my game board, I need to traverse each square in my array once and only once.
The traversal needs to be linked to an adjacent neighbor (horizontal, vertical or diagonal).
I'm using an array structure of the form:
board[n,m] = byte
Each bit of the byte represents a direction 0..7 and exactly 2 bits are always set
Directions are numbered clockwise
0 1 2
7 . 3
6 5 4
Board[0,0] must have some combination of bits 3,4,5 set
My current approach for constructing a random path is:
Start at a random position
While (Squares remain)
if no directions from this square are valid, step backwards
Pick random direction from those remaining in bitfield for this square
Erase the direction to this square from those not picked
Move to the next square
This algorithm takes far too long on some medium sized grids, because earlier choices remove areas from consideration.
What I'd like to have is a function that takes an index into every possible path, and returns with the array filled in for that path. This would let me provide a 'seed' value to return to this particular board.
Other suggestions are welcome..
Essentially, you want to construct a Hamiltonian path: A path that visits each node of a graph exactly once.
In general, even if you only want to test whether a graph contains a Hamiltonian path, that's already NP-complete. In this case, it's obvious that the graph contains at least one Hamiltonian path, and the graph has a nice regular structure -- but enumerating all Hamiltonian paths still seems to be a difficult problem.
The Wikipedia entry on the Hamiltonian path problem has a randomized algorithm for finding a Hamiltonian path that is claimed to be "fast on most graphs". It's different from your algorithm in that it swaps around a whole branch of the path instead of backtracking by just one node. This more "aggressive" strategy might be faster -- try it and see.
You could let your users enter the seed for the random number generator to reconstruct a certain path. You still wouldn't be enumerating all possible paths, but I guess that's probably not necessary for your application.
This was originally a comment to Martin B's post, but it grew a bit, so I'm posting it as an "answer".
Firstly, the problem of enumerating all possible Hamiltonian Paths is quite similar to the #P complexity class --- NP's terrifying older brother. Wikipedia, as always, can explain. It is for this reason that I hope you don't really need to know every path, but just most. If not, well, there's still hope if you can exploit the structure of your graphs.
(Here's a fun way of looking at why enumerating all paths is really hard: Let's say you have 10 paths for the graph, and you think you're done. And evil old me comes over and says "well, prove to me that there isn't an 11th path". Having an answer that could both convince me and not take a while to demonstrate --- that would be pretty impressive! Proving that there doesn't exist any path is co-NP, and that's also quite hard. Proving that there only exists a certain number, that sounds very hard. Its late here, so I'm a bit fuzzy-headed, but so far I think everything I've said is correct.)
Anyways, my google-fu seems particularly weak on this subject, which is surprising, so I don't have a cold answer for you, but I have some hints?
Firstly, if each node has at most 2 outgoing edges, then the number of edges are linear in the number of vertices, and I'm pretty sure that that means its a "sparse" graph, which are typically happier to deal with. But Hamiltonian path is exponential in the number of edges, so there's no really easy way out. :)
Secondly, if the structure of your graph lends itself to this, it may be possible to break the problem up into smaller chunks. Min-cut and strongly-connected-components come to mind. The basic idea would be, ideally, finding that your big graph is in fact, really, 4 smaller graphs with just a few connecting edges between the smaller graphs. Running your HamPath algorithm on those smaller chunks would be considerably faster, and the hope would be that it would be somewhat easy to piece together the sub-graph-paths into the whole-graph-paths. Coincidentally, these are great tongue-twisters. The downside is that these algorithms are a bit difficult to implement, and will require a lot of thought and care to use properly (in the combining of the HamPaths). Furthermore, if your graphs are in fact quite thoroughly connected, this whole paragraph was for naught! :)
So those were just a few ideas. If there is any other aspect of your graph (a particular starting point is required, or a particular ending point, or additional rules about what node can connect to which), it may be quite helpful! The border between NP-complete problems and P (fast) algorithms is often quite thin.
Hope this helps, -Agor.
I would start with a trivial path through the grid, then randomly select locations on the board (using the input seed to seed the random number generator) and perform "switches" on the path where possible. e.g.:
------ to: --\/--
------ --/\--
With enough switches you should get a random-looking path.
Bizarrely enough, I spent an undergrad summer in my Math degree studying this problem as well as coming up with algorithms to address it. First I will comment on the other answers.
Martin B: Correctly identified this as a Hamiltonian path problem. However, if the graph is a regular grid (as you two discussed in the comments) then a Hamiltonian path can trivially be found (snaking row-major order for example.)
agnorest: Correctly talked about the Hamiltonian path problem being in a class of hard problems. agnorest also alluded to possibly exploiting the graph structure, which funny enough, is trivial in the case of a regular grid.
I will now continue the discussion by elaborating on what I think you are trying to achieve. As you mentioned in the comments, it is trivial to find certain classes of "space-filling" non intersecting "walks" on a regular lattice/grid. However, it seems you are not satisfied only with these and would like to find an algorithm that finds "interesting" walks that cover your grid at random. But before I explore that possibility, I'd like to point out that the "non-intersecting" property of these walks is extremely important and what causes the difficulties of enumerating them.
In fact, the thing that I studied in my summer internship is called the Self Avoiding Walk. Surprisingly, the study of SAWs (self avoiding walks) is very important to a few sub-domains of modeling in physics (and was a key ingredient to the Manhattan project!) The algorithm you gave in your question is actually a variant on an algorithm known as the "growth" algorithm or Rosenbluth's algorithm (named after non other than Marshal Rosenbluth). More details on both the general version of this algorithm (used to estimate statistics on SAWs) as well as their relation to physics can be readily found in literature like this thesis.
SAWs in 2 dimensions are notoriously hard to study. Very few theoretical results are known about SAWs in 2 dimensions. Oddly enough, in higher than 3 dimensions you can say that most properties of SAWs are known theoretically, such as their growth constant. Suffice it to say, SAWs in 2 dimensions are very interesting things!
Reigning in this discussion to talk about your problem at hand, you are probably finding that your implementation of the growth algorithm gets "cut off" quite frequently and can not expand to fill the whole of your lattice. In this case, it is more appropriate to view your problem as a Hamiltonian Path problem. My approach to finding interesting Hamiltonian paths would be to formulate the problem as an Integer Linear Program, and add fix random edges to be used in the ILP. The fixing of random edges would give randomness to the generation process, and the ILP portion would efficiently compute whether certain configurations are feasible and if they are would return a solution.
The Code
The following code implements the Hamiltonian path or cycle problem for arbitrary initial conditions. It implements it on a regular 2D lattice with 4-connectivity. The formulation follows the standard sub-tour elimination ILP Lagrangian. The sub-tours are eliminated lazily, meaning there can be potentially many iterations required.
You could augment this to satisfy random or otherwise initial conditions that you deem "interesting" for your problem. If the initial conditions are infeasible it terminates early and prints this.
This code depends on NetworkX and PuLP.
"""
Hamiltonian path formulated as ILP, solved using PuLP, adapted from
https://projects.coin-or.org/PuLP/browser/trunk/examples/Sudoku1.py
Authors: ldog
"""
# Import PuLP modeler functions
from pulp import *
# Solve for Hamiltonian path or cycle
solve_type = 'cycle'
# Define grid size
N = 10
# If solving for path a start and end must be specified
if solve_type == 'path':
start_vertex = (0,0)
end_vertex = (5,5)
# Assuming 4-connectivity (up, down, left, right)
Edges = ["up", "down", "left", "right"]
Sequence = [ i for i in range(N) ]
# The Rows and Cols sequences follow this form, Vals will be which edge is used
Vals = Edges
Rows = Sequence
Cols = Sequence
# The prob variable is created to contain the problem data
prob = LpProblem("Hamiltonian Path Problem",LpMinimize)
# The problem variables are created
choices = LpVariable.dicts("Choice",(Vals,Rows,Cols),0,1,LpInteger)
# The arbitrary objective function is added
prob += 0, "Arbitrary Objective Function"
# A constraint ensuring that exactly two edges per node are used
# (a requirement for the solution to be a walk or path.)
for r in Rows:
for c in Cols:
if solve_type == 'cycle':
prob += lpSum([choices[v][r][c] for v in Vals ]) == 2, ""
elif solve_type == 'path':
if (r,c) == end_vertex or (r,c) == start_vertex:
prob += lpSum([choices[v][r][c] for v in Vals]) == 1, ""
else:
prob += lpSum([choices[v][r][c] for v in Vals]) == 2, ""
# A constraint ensuring that edges between adjacent nodes agree
for r in Rows:
for c in Cols:
#The up direction
if r > 0:
prob += choices["up"][r][c] == choices["down"][r-1][c],""
#The down direction
if r < N-1:
prob += choices["down"][r][c] == choices["up"][r+1][c],""
#The left direction
if c > 0:
prob += choices["left"][r][c] == choices["right"][r][c-1],""
#The right direction
if c < N-1:
prob += choices["right"][r][c] == choices["left"][r][c+1],""
# Ensure boundaries are not used
for c in Cols:
prob += choices["up"][0][c] == 0,""
prob += choices["down"][N-1][c] == 0,""
for r in Rows:
prob += choices["left"][r][0] == 0,""
prob += choices["right"][r][N-1] == 0,""
# Random conditions can be specified to give "interesting" paths or cycles
# that have this condition.
# In the simplest case, just specify one node with fixed edges used.
prob += choices["down"][2][2] == 1,""
prob += choices["up"][2][2] == 1,""
# Keep solving while the smallest cycle is not the whole thing
while True:
# The problem is solved using PuLP's choice of Solver
prob.solve()
# The status of the solution is printed to the screen
status = LpStatus[prob.status]
print "Status:", status
if status == 'Infeasible':
print 'The set of conditions imposed are impossible to solve for. Change the conditions.'
break
import networkx as nx
g = nx.Graph()
g.add_nodes_from([i for i in range(N*N)])
for r in Rows:
for c in Cols:
if value(choices['up'][r][c]) == 1:
nr = r - 1
nc = c
g.add_edge(r*N+c,nr*N+nc)
if value(choices['down'][r][c]) == 1:
nr = r + 1
nc = c
g.add_edge(r*N+c,nr*N+nc)
if value(choices['left'][r][c]) == 1:
nr = r
nc = c - 1
g.add_edge(r*N+c,nr*N+nc)
if value(choices['right'][r][c]) == 1:
nr = r
nc = c + 1
g.add_edge(r*N+c,nr*N+nc)
# Get connected components sorted by length
cc = sorted(nx.connected_components(g), key = len)
# For the shortest, add the remove cycle condition
def ngb(idx,v):
r = idx/N
c = idx%N
if v == 'up':
nr = r - 1
nc = c
if v == 'down':
nr = r + 1
nc = c
if v == 'left':
nr = r
nc = c - 1
if v == 'right':
nr = r
nc = c + 1
return nr*N+c
prob += lpSum([choices[v][idx/N][idx%N] for v in Vals for idx in cc[0] if ngb(idx,v) in cc[0] ]) \
<= 2*(len(cc[0]))-1, ""
# Pretty print the solution
if len(cc[0]) == N*N:
print ''
print '***************************'
print ' This is the final solution'
print '***************************'
for r in Rows:
s = ""
for c in Cols:
if value(choices['up'][r][c]) == 1:
s += " | "
else:
s += " "
print s
s = ""
for c in Cols:
if value(choices['left'][r][c]) == 1:
s += "-"
else:
s += " "
s += "X"
if value(choices['right'][r][c]) == 1:
s += "-"
else:
s += " "
print s
s = ""
for c in Cols:
if value(choices['down'][r][c]) == 1:
s += " | "
else:
s += " "
print s
if len(cc[0]) != N*N:
print 'Press key to continue to next iteration (which eliminates a suboptimal subtour) ...'
elif len(cc[0]) == N*N:
print 'Press key to terminate'
raw_input()
if len(cc[0]) == N*N:
break
Related
I understand that there are mainly two approaches to dynamic programming solutions:
Fixed optimal order of evaluation (lets call it Foo approach): Foo approach usually goes from subproblems to bigger problems thus using results obtained earlier for subproblems to solve bigger problems, thus avoiding "revisiting" subproblem. CLRS also seems to call this "Bottom Up" approach.
Without fixed optimal order of evaluation (lets call it Non-Foo approach): In this approach evaluation proceeds from problems to their sub-problems . It ensures that sub problems are not "re-evaluated" (thus ensuring optimality) by maintaining results of their past evaluations in some data structure and then first checking if the result of the problem at hand exists in this data structure before starting its evaluation. CLRS seem to call this as "Top Down" approach
This is what is roughly conveyed as one of the main points by this answer.
I have following doubts:
Q1. Memoization or not?
CLRS uses terms "top down with memoization" approach and "bottom up" approach. I feel both approaches require memory to cache results of sub problems. But, then, why CLRS use term "memoization" only for top down approach and not for bottom up approach? After solving some problems by DP approach, I feel that solutions by top down approach for all problems require memory to caches results of "all" subproblems. However, that is not the case with bottom up approach. Solutions by bottom up approach for some problems does not need to cache results of "all" sub problems. Q1. Am I correct with this?
For example consider this problem:
Given cost[i] being the cost of ith step on a staircase, give the minimum cost of reaching the top of the floor if:
you can climb either one or two steps
you can start from the step with index 0, or the step with index 1
The top down approach solution is as follows:
class Solution:
def minCostAux(self, curStep, cost):
if self.minCosts[curStep] > -1:
return self.minCosts[curStep]
if curStep == -1:
return 0
elif curStep == 0:
self.minCosts[curStep] = cost[0]
else:
self.minCosts[curStep] = min(self.minCostAux(curStep-2, cost) + cost[curStep]
, self.minCostAux(curStep-1, cost) + cost[curStep])
return self.minCosts[curStep]
def minCostClimbingStairs(self, cost) -> int:
cost.append(0)
self.minCosts = [-1] * len(cost)
return self.minCostAux(len(cost)-1, cost)
The bottom up approach solution is as follows:
class Solution:
def minCostClimbingStairs(self, cost) -> int:
cost.append(0)
secondLastMinCost = cost[0]
lastMinCost = min(cost[0]+cost[1], cost[1])
minCost = lastMinCost
for i in range(2,len(cost)):
minCost = min(lastMinCost, secondLastMinCost) + cost[i]
secondLastMinCost = lastMinCost
lastMinCost = minCost
return minCost
Note that the top down approach caches result of all steps in self.minCosts while bottom up approach caches result of only last two steps in variables lastMinCost and secondLastMinCost.
Q2. Does all problems have solutions by both approaches?
I feel no. I came to this opinion after solving this problem:
Find the probability that the knight will not go out of n x n chessboard after k moves, if the knight was initially kept in the cell at index (row, column).
I feel the only way to solve this problem is to find successive probabilities in increasing number of steps starting from cell (row, column), that is probability that the knight will not go out of chessboard after step 1, then after step 2, then after step 3 and so on. This is bottom up approach. We cannot do it top down, for example, we cannot start with kth step and go to k-1th step, then k-2th step and so on, because:
We cannot know which cells will be reached in kth step to start with
We cannot ensure that all paths from kth step will lead to initial knight cell position (row,column).
Even one of the top voted answer gives dp solution as follows:
class Solution {
private int[][]dir = new int[][]{{-2,-1},{-1,-2},{1,-2},{2,-1},{2,1},{1,2},{-1,2},{-2,1}};
private double[][][] dp;
public double knightProbability(int N, int K, int r, int c) {
dp = new double[N][N][K + 1];
return find(N,K,r,c);
}
public double find(int N,int K,int r,int c){
if(r < 0 || r > N - 1 || c < 0 || c > N - 1) return 0;
if(K == 0) return 1;
if(dp[r][c][K] != 0) return dp[r][c][K];
double rate = 0;
for(int i = 0;i < dir.length;i++) rate += 0.125 * find(N,K - 1,r + dir[i][0],c + dir[i][1]);
dp[r][c][K] = rate;
return rate;
}
}
I feel this is still a bottom up approach since it starts with initial knight cell position (r,c) (and hence starts from 0th or no step to Kth step) despite the fact that it counts K downwads to 0. So, this is bottom up approach done recursively and not top down approach. To be precise, this solution does NOT first find:
probability of knight not going out of chessboard after K steps starting at cell (r,c)
and then find:
probability of knight not going out of chessboard after K-1 steps starting at cell (r,c)
but it finds in reverse / bottom up order: first for K-1 steps and then for K steps.
Also, I did not find any solutions in of top voted discussions in leetcode doing it in truly top down manner, starting from Kth step to 0th step ending in (row,column) cell, instead of starting with (row,column) cell.
Similarly we cannot solve the following problem with the bottom up approach but only with top down approach:
Find the probability that the Knight ends up in the cell at index (row,column) after K steps, starting at any initial cell.
Q2. So am I correct with my understanding that not all problems have solutions by both top down or bottom up approaches? Or am I just overthinking unnecessarily and both above problems can indeed be solved with both top down and bottom up approaches?
PS: I indeed seem to have done overthinking here: knightProbability() function above is indeed top down, and I ill-interpreted as explained in detailed above 😑. I have kept this explanation for reference as there are already some answers below and also as a hint of how confusion / mis-interpretaions might happen, so that I will be more cautious in future. Sorry if this long explanation caused you some confusion / frustrations. Regardless, the main question still holds: does every problem have bottom up and top down solutions?
Q3. Bottom up approach recursively?
I am pondering if bottom up solutions for all problems can also be implemented recursively. After trying to do so for other problems, I came to following conclusion:
We can implement bottom up solutions for such problems recursively, only that the recursion won't be meaningful, but kind of hacky.
For example, below is recursive bottom up solution for minimum cost climbing stairs problem mentioned in Q1:
class Solution:
def minCostAux(self, step_i, cost):
if self.minCosts[step_i] != -1:
return self.minCosts[step_i]
self.minCosts[step_i] = min(self.minCostAux(step_i-1, cost)
, self.minCostAux(step_i-2, cost)) + cost[step_i]
if step_i == len(cost)-1: # returning from non-base case, gives sense of
# not-so meaningful recursion.
# Also, base cases usually appear at the
# beginning, before recursive call.
# Or should we call it "ceil condition"?
return self.minCosts[step_i]
return self.minCostAux(step_i+1, cost)
def minCostClimbingStairs(self, cost: List[int]) -> int:
cost.append(0)
self.minCosts = [-1] * len(cost)
self.minCosts[0] = cost[0]
self.minCosts[1] = min(cost[0]+cost[1], cost[1])
return self.minCostAux(2, cost)
Is my quoted understanding correct?
First, context.
Every dynamic programming problem can be solved without dynamic programming using a recursive function. Generally this will take exponential time, but you can always do it. At least in principle. If the problem can't be written that way, then it really isn't a dynamic programming problem.
The idea of dynamic programming is that if I already did a calculation and have a saved result, I can just use that saved result instead of doing the calculation again.
The whole top-down vs bottom-up distinction refers to the naive recursive solution.
In a top-down approach your call stack looks like the naive version except that you make a "memo" of what the recursive result would have given. And then the next time you short-circuit the call and return the memo. This means you can always, always, always solve dynamic programming problems top down. There is always a solution that looks like recursion+memoization. And that solution by definition is top down.
In a bottom up approach you start with what some of the bottom levels would have been and build up from there. Because you know the structure of the data very clearly, frequently you are able to know when you are done with data and can throw it away, saving memory. Occasionally you can filter data on non-obvious conditions that are hard for memoization to duplicate, making bottom up faster as well. For a concrete example of the latter, see Sorting largest amounts to fit total delay.
Start with your summary.
I strongly disagree with your thinking about the distinction in terms of the optimal order of evaluations. I've encountered many cases with top down where optimizing the order of evaluations will cause memoization to start hitting sooner, making code run faster. Conversely while bottom up certainly picks a convenient order of operations, it is not always optimal.
Now to your questions.
Q1: Correct. Bottom up often knows when it is done with data, top down does not. Therefore bottom up gives you the opportunity to delete data when you are done with it. And you gave an example where this happens.
As for why only one is called memoization, it is because memoization is a specific technique for optimizing a function, and you get top down by memoizing recursion. While the data stored in dynamic programming may match up to specific memos in memoization, you aren't using the memoization technique.
Q2: I do not know.
I've personally found cases where I was solving a problem over some complex data structure and simply couldn't find a bottom up approach. Maybe I simply wasn't clever enough, but I don't believe that a bottom up approach always exists to be found.
But top down is always possible. Here is how to do it in Python for the example that you gave.
First the naive recursive solution looks like this:
def prob_in_board(n, i, j, k):
if i < 0 or j < 0 or n <= i or n <= j:
return 0
elif k <= 0:
return 1
else:
moves = [
(i+1, j+2), (i+1, j-2),
(i-1, j+2), (i-1, j-2),
(i+2, j+1), (i+2, j-1),
(i-2, j+1), (i-2, j-1),
]
answer = 0
for next_i, next_j in moves:
answer += prob_in_board(n, next_i, next_j, k-1) / len(moves)
return answer
print(prob_in_board(8, 3, 4, 7))
And now we just memoize.
def prob_in_board_memoized(n, i, j, k, cache=None):
if cache is None:
cache = {}
if i < 0 or j < 0 or n <= i or n <= j:
return 0
elif k <= 0:
return 1
elif (i, j, k) not in cache:
moves = [
(i+1, j+2), (i+1, j-2),
(i-1, j+2), (i-1, j-2),
(i+2, j+1), (i+2, j-1),
(i-2, j+1), (i-2, j-1),
]
answer = 0
for next_i, next_j in moves:
answer += prob_in_board_memoized(n, next_i, next_j, k-1, cache) / len(moves)
cache[(i, j, k)] = answer
return cache[(i, j, k)]
print(prob_in_board_memoized(8, 3, 4, 7))
This solution is top down. If it seems otherwise to you, then you do not correctly understand what is meant by top-down.
I found your question ( does every dynamic programming problem have bottom up and top down solutions ? ) very interesting. That's why I'm adding another answer to continue the discussion about it.
To answer the question in its generic form, I need to formulate it more precisely with math. First, I need to formulate precisely what is a dynamic programming problem. Then, I need to define precisely what is a bottom up solution and what is a top down solution.
I will try to put some definitions but I think they are not the most generic ones. I think a really generic definition would need more heavy math.
First, define a state space S of dimension d as a subset of Z^d (Z represents the integers set).
Let f: S -> R be a function that we are interested in calculate for a given point P of the state space S (R represents the real numbers set).
Let t: S -> S^k be a transition function (it associates points in the state space to sets of points in the state space).
Consider the problem of calculating f on a point P in S.
We can consider it as a dynamic programming problem if there is a function g: R^k -> R such that f(P) = g(f(t(P)[0]), f(t(P)[1]), ..., f(t(P)[k])) (a problem can be solved only by using sub problems) and t defines a directed graph that is not a tree (sub problems have some overlap).
Consider the graph defined by t. We know it has a source (the point P) and some sinks for which we know the value of f (the base cases). We can define a top down solution for the problem as a depth first search through this graph that starts in the source and calculate f for each vertex at its return time (when the depth first search of all its sub graph is completed) using the transition function. On the other hand, a bottom up solution for the problem can be defined as a multi source breadth first search through the transposed graph that starts in the sinks and finishes in the source vertex, calculating f at each visited vertex using the previous visited layer.
The problem is: to navigate through the transposed graph, for each point you visit you need to know what points transition to this point in the original graph. In math terms, for each point Q in the transition graph, you need to know the set J of points such that for each point Pi in J, t(Pi) contains Q and there is no other point Pr in the state space outside of J such that t(Pr) contains Q. Notice that a trivial way to know this is to visit all the state space for each point Q.
The conclusion is that a bottom up solution as defined here always exists but it only compensates if you have a way to navigate through the transposed graph at least as efficiently as navigating through the original graph. This depends essentially in the properties of the transition function.
In particular, for the leetcode problem you mentioned, the transition function is the function that, for each point in the chessboard, gives all the points to which the knight can go to. A very special property about this function is that it's symmetric: if the knight can go from A to B, then it can also go from B to A. So, given a certain point P, you can know to which points the knight can go as efficiently as you can know from which points the knight can come from. This is the property that guarantees you that there exists a bottom up approach as efficient as the top down approach for this problem.
For the leetcode question you mentioned, the top down approach is like the following:
Let P(x, y, k) be the probability that the knight is at the square (x, y) at the k-th step. Look at all squares that the knight could have come from (you can get them in O(1), just look at the board with a pen and paper and get the formulas from the different cases, like knight in the corner, knight in the border, knight in a central region etc). Let them be (x1, y1), ... (xj, yj). For each of these squares, what is the probability that the knight jumps to (x, y) ? Considering that it can go out of the border, it's always 1/8. So:
P(x, y, k) = (P(x1, y1, k-1) + ... + P(xj, yj, k-1))/8
The base case is k = 0:
P(x, y ,0) = 1 if (x, y) = (x_start, y_start) and P(x, y, 0) = 0 otherwise.
You iterate through all n^2 squares and use the recurrence formula to calculate P(x, y, k). Many times you will need solutions you already calculated for k-1 and so you can benefit a lot from memoization.
In the end, the final solution will be the sum of P(x, y, k) over all squares of the board.
I'm trying to build a genetic algorithm that can solve the distance-constrained vehicle routing problem (DVRP). This is a subset of the Traveling Salesman Problem, and asks the following question:
"What is the optimal set of routes for a fleet of vehicles to traverse in order to deliver to a given set of customers, given that each vehicle has a maximum distance it can travel? Vehicles must all start and stop at the depot.
This secondary constraint has been giving me trouble, as it seems that when I attempt solving this as one would with other TSP/VRP problems, the same approach no longer applies. The issue seems to specifically stem from mutation/crossover of solutions, as there is no long-term positive trend in distance/fitness.
This is demonstrated by the graph that I plotted above, where, with distance on the y-axis and generations on the x-axis, there is no discernible non-random change. Here, blue represents the average distance for the solutions in that generation, and orange the best in that generation.
I am encoding my solution according to the algorithm described on page 7 of this paper.
An example is above, with 10 destinations and 4 vehicles. Numbers 1-10 represent destinations, and 11-14 vehicles (14 is omitted as it must be at the front). The number 0 represents the depot, and is also omitted - but when calculating fitness, it will be added back in as the first and last destination for every route for each vehicle.
With such an encoding in mind, I am using the ordered crossover operator commonly used for VRP problems. It and my mutation algorithm (simply swapping two elements in the encoding) follow their relative description exactly, but fail to produce results as shown in the graph earlier.
Crossover
def crossover(self, path1, path2):
# path1 and path2 are lists of integers as described above
# Step 1: Select a random swath of consecutive alleles from parent 1.
cut_point_1 = random.randint(0, len(path1) - 1)
cut_point_2 = random.randint(0, len(path2) - 1)
if cut_point_1 > cut_point_2:
cut_point_1, cut_point_2 = cut_point_2, cut_point_1
# Drop the swath down to child 1
swath = path1[cut_point_1:cut_point_2]
child = [None] * len(path1)
child[cut_point_1:cut_point_2] = swath
swath_points = [e for e in swath]
# Mark out these alleles in Parent 2.
# each point is visited only once
final_path2 = path2.copy()
for i in range(len(path2)):
if path2[i] in swath_points: # parents share some visited point
final_path2.remove(path2[i])
# fill empty spaces in child with remaining alleles from path2
for i in range(len(child)):
if child[i] is None:
child[i] = final_path2.pop(0)
if random.random() < self.mutation_rate:
return self.mutate(child)
return child
Mutation
def mutate(self, solution):
"""
Just swaps two random nodes. Keeps doing so until we find a valid solution
(one where all individual vehicle routes are at most vehicle_max_distance).
"""
# swap two random elements in solution
while True:
i = random.randint(0, len(solution) - 1)
j = random.randint(0, len(solution) - 1)
if i != j:
solution[i], solution[j] = solution[j], solution[i]
if self.is_valid_solution(solution):
return solution
solution[i], solution[j] = (
solution[j],
solution[i],
) # is not valid, reset
If the implementation is correct, is there any alternative genetic algorithm-based approach for solving this optimization problem?
The entire code can be found here.
There's an existing question dealing with trees where the weight of a vertex is its degree, but I'm interested in the case where the vertices can have arbitrary weights.
This isn't homework but it is one of the questions in the algorithm design manual, which I'm currently reading; an answer set gives the solution as
Perform a DFS, at each step update Score[v][include], where v is a vertex and include is either true or false;
If v is a leaf, set Score[v][false] = 0, Score[v][true] = wv, where wv is the weight of vertex v.
During DFS, when moving up from the last child of the node v, update Score[v][include]:
Score[v][false] = Sum for c in children(v) of Score[c][true] and Score[v][true] = wv + Sum for c in children(v) of min(Score[c][true]; Score[c][false])
Extract actual cover by backtracking Score.
However, I can't actually translate that into something that works. (In response to the comment: what I've tried so far is drawing some smallish graphs with weights and running through the algorithm on paper, up until step four, where the "extract actual cover" part is not transparent.)
In response Ali's answer: So suppose I have this graph, with the vertices given by A etc. and the weights in parens after:
A(9)---B(3)---C(2)
\ \
E(1) D(4)
The right answer is clearly {B,E}.
Going through this algorithm, we'd set values like so:
score[D][false] = 0; score[D][true] = 4
score[C][false] = 0; score[C][true] = 2
score[B][false] = 6; score[B][true] = 3
score[E][false] = 0; score[E][true] = 1
score[A][false] = 4; score[A][true] = 12
Ok, so, my question is basically, now what? Doing the simple thing and iterating through the score vector and deciding what's cheapest locally doesn't work; you only end up including B. Deciding based on the parent and alternating also doesn't work: consider the case where the weight of E is 1000; now the correct answer is {A,B}, and they're adjacent. Perhaps it is not supposed to be confusing, but frankly, I'm confused.
There's no actual backtracking done (or needed). The solution uses dynamic programming to avoid backtracking, since that'd take exponential time. My guess is "backtracking Score" means the Score contains the partial results you would get by doing backtracking.
The cover vertex of a tree allows to include alternated and adjacent vertices. It does not allow to exclude two adjacent vertices, because it must contain all of the edges.
The answer is given in the way the Score is recursively calculated. The cost of not including a vertex, is the cost of including its children. However, the cost of including a vertex is whatever is less costly, the cost of including its children or not including them, because both things are allowed.
As your solution suggests, it can be done with DFS in post-order, in a single pass. The trick is to include a vertex if the Score says it must be included, and include its children if it must be excluded, otherwise we'd be excluding two adjacent vertices.
Here's some pseudocode:
find_cover_vertex_of_minimum_weight(v)
find_cover_vertex_of_minimum_weight(left children of v)
find_cover_vertex_of_minimum_weight(right children of v)
Score[v][false] = Sum for c in children(v) of Score[c][true]
Score[v][true] = v weight + Sum for c in children(v) of min(Score[c][true]; Score[c][false])
if Score[v][true] < Score[v][false] then
add v to cover vertex tree
else
for c in children(v)
add c to cover vertex tree
It actually didnt mean any thing confusing and it is just Dynamic Programming, you seems to almost understand all the algorithm. If I want to make it any more clear, I have to say:
first preform DFS on you graph and find leafs.
for every leaf assign values as the algorithm says.
now start from leafs and assign values to each leaf parent by that formula.
start assigning values to parent of nodes that already have values until you reach the root of your graph.
That is just it, by backtracking in your algorithm it means that you assign value to each node that its child already have values. As I said above this kind of solving problem is called dynamic programming.
Edit just for explaining your changes in the question. As you you have the following graph and answer is clearly B,E but you though this algorithm just give you B and you are incorrect this algorithm give you B and E.
A(9)---B(3)---C(2)
\ \
E(1) D(4)
score[D][false] = 0; score[D][true] = 4
score[C][false] = 0; score[C][true] = 2
score[B][false] = 6 this means we use C and D; score[B][true] = 3 this means we use B
score[E][false] = 0; score[E][true] = 1
score[A][false] = 4 This means we use B and E; score[A][true] = 12 this means we use B and A.
and you select 4 so you must use B and E. if it was just B your answer would be 3. but as you find it correctly your answer is 4 = 3 + 1 = B + E.
Also when E = 1000
A(9)---B(3)---C(2)
\ \
E(1000) D(4)
it is 100% correct that the answer is B and A because it is wrong to use E just because you dont want to select adjacent nodes. with this algorithm you will find the answer is A and B and just by checking you can find it too. suppose this covers :
C D A = 15
C D E = 1006
A B = 12
Although the first two answer have no adjacent nodes but they are bigger than last answer that have adjacent nodes. so it is best to use A and B for cover.
I have a really difficult problem to solve and Im just wondering what what algorithm can be used to find the quickest route. The undirected graph consist of positive and negative adjustments, these adjustments effect a bot or thing which navigate the maze. The problem I have is mazes which contain loops that can be + or -. An example might help:-
node A gives 10 points to the object
node B takes 15 from the object
node C gives 20 points to the object
route=""
the starting node is A, and the ending node is C
given the graph structure as:-
a(+10)-----b(-15)-----c+20
node() means the node loops to itself - and + are the adjustments
nodes with no loops are c+20, so node c has a positive adjustment of 20 but has no loops
if the bot or object has 10 points in its resource then the best path would be :-
a > b > c the object would have 25 points when it arrives at c
route="a,b,c"
this is quite easy to implement, the next challenge is knowing how to backtrack to a good node, lets assume that at each node you can find out any of its neighbour's nodes and their adjustment level. here is the next example:-
if the bot started with only 5 points then the best path would be
a > a > b > c the bot would have 25 points when arriving at c
route="a,a,b,c"
this was a very simple graph, but when you have lots of more nodes it becomes very difficult for the bot to know whether to loop at a good node or go from one good node to another, while keeping track of a possible route.
such a route would be a backtrack queue.
A harder example would result in lots of going back and forth
bot has 10 points
a(+10)-----b(-5)-----c-30
a > b > a > b > a > b > a > b > a > b > c having 5 pts left.
another way the bot could do it is:-
a > a > a > b > c
this is a more efficient way, but how the heck you can program this is partly my question.
does anyone know of a good algorithm to solve this, ive already looked into Bellman-fords and Dijkstra but these only give a simple path not a looping one.
could it be recursive in some way or some form of heuristics?
referring to your analogy:-
I think I get what you mean, a bit of pseudo would be clearer, so far route()
q.add(v)
best=v
hash visited(v,true)
while(q is not empty)
q.remove(v)
for each u of v in G
if u not visited before
visited(u,true)
best=u=>v.dist
else
best=v=>u.dist
This is a straightforward dynamic programming problem.
Suppose that for a given length of path, for each node, you want to know the best cost ending at that node, and where that route came from. (The data for that length can be stored in a hash, the route in a linked list.)
Suppose we have this data for n steps. Then for the n+1st we start with a clean slate, and then take each answer for the n'th, move it one node forward, and if we land on a node we don't have data for, or else that we're better than the best found, then we update the data for that node with our improved score, and add the route (just this node linking back to the previous linked list).
Once we have this for the number of steps you want, find the node with the best existing route, and then you have your score and your route as a linked list.
========
Here is actual code implementing the algorithm:
class Graph:
def __init__(self, nodes=[]):
self.nodes = {}
for node in nodes:
self.insert(node)
def insert(self, node):
self.nodes[ node.name ] = node
def connect(self, name1, name2):
node1 = self.nodes[ name1 ]
node2 = self.nodes[ name2 ]
node1.neighbors.add(node2)
node2.neighbors.add(node1)
def node(self, name):
return self.nodes[ name ]
class GraphNode:
def __init__(self, name, score, neighbors=[]):
self.name = name
self.score = score
self.neighbors = set(neighbors)
def __repr__(self):
return self.name
def find_path (start_node, start_score, end_node):
prev_solution = {start_node: [start_score + start_node.score, None]}
room_to_grow = True
while end_node not in prev_solution:
if not room_to_grow:
# No point looping endlessly...
return None
room_to_grow = False
solution = {}
for node, info in prev_solution.iteritems():
score, prev_path = info
for neighbor in node.neighbors:
new_score = score + neighbor.score
if neighbor not in prev_solution:
room_to_grow = True
if 0 < new_score and (neighbor not in solution or solution[neighbor][0] < new_score):
solution[neighbor] = [new_score, [node, prev_path]]
prev_solution = solution
path = prev_solution[end_node][1]
answer = [end_node]
while path is not None:
answer.append(path[0])
path = path[1]
answer.reverse()
return answer
And here is a sample of how to use it:
graph = Graph([GraphNode('A', 10), GraphNode('B', -5), GraphNode('C', -30)])
graph.connect('A', 'A')
graph.connect('A', 'B')
graph.connect('B', 'B')
graph.connect('B', 'B')
graph.connect('B', 'C')
graph.connect('C', 'C')
print find_path(graph.node('A'), 10, graph.node('C'))
Note that I explicitly connected each node to itself. Depending on your problem you might want to make that automatic.
(Note, there is one possible infinite loop left. Suppose that the starting node has a score of 0 and there is no way off of it. In that case we'll loop forever. It would take work to add a check for this case.)
I'm a little confused by your description, it seems like you are just looking for shortest path algorithms. In which case google is your friend.
In the example you've given you have -ve adjustments which should really be +ve costs in the usual parlance of graph traversal. I.e. you want to find a path with the lowest cost so you want more +ve adjustments.
If your graph has loops that are beneficial to traverse (i.e. decrease cost or increase points through adjustments) then the best path is undefined because going through the loop one more time will improve your score.
Here's some psuedocode
steps = []
steps[0] = [None*graph.#nodes]
step = 1
while True:
steps[step] = [None*graph.#nodes]
for node in graph:
for node2 in graph:
steps[step][node2.index] = max(steps[step-1][node.index]+node2.cost, steps[step][node2.index])
if steps[step][lastnode] >= 0:
break;
I have a set of students (referred to as items in the title for generality). Amongst these students, some have a reputation for being rambunctious. We are told about a set of hate relationships of the form 'i hates j'. 'i hates j' does not imply 'j hates i'. We are supposed to arrange the students in rows (front most row numbered 1) in a way such that if 'i hates j' then i should be put in a row that is strictly lesser numbered than that of j (in other words: in some row that is in front of j's row) so that i doesn't throw anything at j (Turning back is not allowed). What would be an efficient algorithm to find the minimum number of rows needed (each row need not have the same number of students)?
We will make the following assumptions:
1) If we model this as a directed graph, there are no cycles in the graph. The most basic cycle would be: if 'i hates j' is true, 'j hates i' is false. Because otherwise, I think the ordering would become impossible.
2) Every student in the group is at least hated by one other student OR at least hates one other student. Of course, there would be students who are both hated by some and who in turn hate other students. This means that there are no stray students who don't form part of the graph.
Update: I have already thought of constructing a directed graph with i --> j if 'i hates j and doing topological sorting. However, since the general topological sort would suit better if I had to line all the students in a single line. Since there is a variation of the rows here, I am trying to figure out how to factor in the change into topological sort so it gives me what I want.
When you answer, please state the complexity of your solution. If anybody is giving code and you don't mind the language, then I'd prefer Java but of course any other language is just as fine.
JFYI This is not for any kind of homework (I am not a student btw :)).
It sounds to me that you need to investigate topological sorting.
This problem is basically another way to put the longest path in a directed graph problem. The number of rows is actually number of nodes in path (number of edges + 1).
Assuming the graph is acyclic, the solution is topological sort.
Acyclic is a bit stronger the your assumption 1. Not only A -> B and B -> A is invalid. Also A -> B, B -> C, C -> A and any cycle of any length.
HINT: the question is how many rows are needed, not which student in which row. The answer to the question is the length of the longest path.
It's from a project management theory (or scheduling theory, I don't know the exact term). There the task is about sorting jobs (vertex is a job, arc is a job order relationship).
Obviously we have some connected oriented graph without loops. There is an arc from vertex a to vertex b if and only if a hates b. Let's assume there is a source (without incoming arcs) and destination (without outgoing arcs) vertex. If that is not the case, just add imaginary ones. Now we want to find length of a longest path from source to destination (it will be number of rows - 1, but mind the imaginary verteces).
We will define vertex rank (r[v]) as number of arcs in a longest path between source and this vertex v. Obviously we want to know r[destination]. Algorithm for finding rank:
0) r_0[v] := 0 for all verteces v
repeat
t) r_t[end(j)] := max( r_{t-1}[end(j)], r_{t-1}[start(j)] + 1 ) for all arcs j
until for all arcs j r_{t+1}[end(j)] = r_t[end(j)] // i.e. no changes on this iteration
On each step at least one vertex increases its rank. Therefore in this form complexity is O(n^3).
By the way, this algorithm also gives you student distribution among rows. Just group students by their respective ranks.
Edit: Another code with the same idea. Possibly it is better understandable.
# Python
# V is a list of vertex indices, let it be something like V = range(N)
# source has index 0, destination has index N-1
# E is a list of edges, i.e. tuples of the form (start vertex, end vertex)
R = [0] * len(V)
do:
changes = False
for e in E:
if R[e[1]] < R[e[0]] + 1:
changes = True
R[e[1]] = R[e[0]] + 1
while changes
# The answer is derived from value of R[N-1]
Of course this is the simplest implementation. It can be optimized, and time estimate can be better.
Edit2: obvious optimization - update only verteces adjacent to those that were updated on the previous step. I.e. introduce a queue with verteces whose rank was updated. Also for edge storing one should use adjacency lists. With such optimization complexity would be O(N^2). Indeed, each vertex may appear in the queue at most rank times. But vertex rank never exceeds N - number of verteces. Therefore total number of algorithm steps will not exceed O(N^2).
Essentailly the important thing in assumption #1 is that there must not be any cycles in this graph. If there are any cycles you can't solve this problem.
I would start by seating all of the students that do not hate any other students in the back row. Then you can seat the students who hate these students in the next row and etc.
The number of rows is the length of the longest path in the directed graph, plus one. As a limit case, if there is no hate relationship everyone can fit on the same row.
To allocate the rows, put everyone who is not hated by anyone else on the row one. These are the "roots" of your graph. Everyone else is put on row N + 1 if N is the length of the longest path from any of the roots to that person (this path is of length one at least).
A simple O(N^3) algorithm is the following:
S = set of students
for s in S: s.row = -1 # initialize row field
rownum = 0 # start from first row below
flag = true # when to finish
while (flag):
rownum = rownum + 1 # proceed to next row
flag = false
for s in S:
if (s.row != -1) continue # already allocated
ok = true
foreach q in S:
# Check if there is student q who will sit
# on this or later row who hates s
if ((q.row == -1 or q.row = rownum)
and s hated by q) ok = false; break
if (ok): # can put s here
s.row = rownum
flag = true
Simple answer = 1 row.
Put all students in the same row.
Actually that might not solve the question as stated - lesser row, rather than equal row...
Put all students in row 1
For each hate relation, put the not-hating student in a row behind the hating student
Iterate till you have no activity, or iterate Num(relation) times.
But I'm sure there are better algorithms - look at acyclic graphs.
Construct a relationship graph where i hates j will have a directed edge from i to j. So end result is a directed graph. It should be a DAG otherwise no solutions as it's not possible to resolve circular hate relations ship.
Now simply do a DFS search and during the post node callbacks, means the once the DFS of all the children are done and before returning from the DFS call to this node, simply check the row number of all the children and assign the row number of this node as row max row of the child + 1. Incase if there is some one who doesn't hate anyone basically node with no adjacency list simply assign him row 0.
Once all the nodes are processed reverse the row numbers. This should be easy as this is just about finding the max and assigning the row numbers as max-already assigned row numbers.
Here is the sample code.
postNodeCb( graph g, int node )
{
if ( /* No adj list */ )
row[ node ] = 0;
else
row[ node ] = max( row number of all children ) + 1;
}
main()
{
.
.
for ( int i = 0; i < NUM_VER; i++ )
if ( !visited[ i ] )
graphTraverseDfs( g, i );`enter code here`
.
.
}