RabbitFarm

2023-08-20

The Weekly Challenge 230 (Prolog Solutions)

The examples used here are from the weekly challenge problem statement and demonstrate the working solution.

Part 1

You are given an array of positive integers. Write a script to separate the given array into single digits.

Solution


clone(X, [X]).

separate(Number, Digits):-
    number_chars(Number, Chars),
    maplist(clone, Chars, DigitChars),
    maplist(number_chars, Digits, DigitChars).

separate_digits(Numbers, Digits):-
    maplist(separate, Numbers, D),
    flatten(D, Digits).

Sample Run


$ gprolog --consult-file prolog/ch-1.p
| ?- separate_digits([1, 34, 5, 6], Digits).

Digits = [1,3,4,5,6] ? 

yes

Notes

For a long time I really never embraced the full power of maplist. At present I can't seem to get enough! In this solution to TWC230.1 we use maplist to first create a singleton list for each digit character in each of the given numbers, we then use maplist to convert these singleton lists to single digit numbers as required.

Part 2

You are given an array of words made up of alphabetic characters and a prefix. Write a script to return the count of words that starts with the given prefix.

Solution


prefix_match(Prefix, Word, Match):-
    atom_chars(Prefix, PrefixChars),
    atom_chars(Word, WordChars),
    ((prefix(PrefixChars, WordChars), Match = 1);
     (\+ prefix(PrefixChars, WordChars), Match = 0)).

count_words(Prefix, Words, Count):-
    maplist(prefix_match(Prefix), Words, Matches),
    sum_list(Matches, Count).

Sample Run


$ gprolog --consult-file prolog/ch-2.p
| ?- count_words(at, [pay, attention, practice, attend], Count).

Count = 2 ? 

yes
| ?- count_words(ja, [janet, julia, java, javascript], Count).  

Count = 3 ? 

(1 ms) yes
| ?- 

Notes

Another nice use of maplist, but a bit less gratuitous. In this solution to TWC230.2 we use maplist to generate a list of 0s or 1s, depending on whether a given word starts with the given prefix. The count of matching words is then the sum_list/2 of those results.

References

Challenge 230

posted at: 21:40 by: Adam Russell | path: /prolog | permanent link to this entry