May 2017

[a1call]

Just submitted my solution. For the record the solutions don't seem abundant. A 53 character limit means there can be only one hyphen.
Brute force does not seem to be the correct approach.

[EdH]

Originally Posted by a1call

Just submitted my solution. For the record the solutions don't seem abundant. A 53 character limit means there can be only one hyphen.
Brute force does not seem to be the correct approach.

If this is true, I am lost in my understanding. My program found thousands of strings that satisfy my understanding of the solution, before I CTRL-C'd it.

I await further understanding...

Edit: I am currently letting my program run. It is nowhere near finishing, but it has found over 13000 strings at about ten minutes.

[science_man_88]

Originally Posted by EdH

If this is true, I am lost in my understanding. My program found thousands of strings that satisfy my understanding of the solution, before I CTRL-C'd it.

I await further understanding...

I made an error in my own solution but logic dictates that solutions come in pairs. I came up with my solution using notepad and a few logically reasoned ideas.

[a1call]

Originally Posted by EdH

If this is true, I am lost in my understanding. My program found thousands of strings that satisfy my understanding of the solution, before I CTRL-C'd it.

I await further understanding...

There are 26 letters
2 instances of each letter are required to establish a gap equal to the priority of the letter

2 x 26 = 52

Number of hyphens in a 53 character string = 53 - 52 = 1

[EdH]

Originally Posted by a1call

There are 26 letters
2 instances of each letter are required to establish a gap equal to the priority of the letter

2 x 26 = 52

Number of hyphens in a 53 character string = 53 - 52 = 1

I was more referring to your abundance mention. I do believe I understand the challenge, yet, if you are correct about there not being many, than I may be misunderstanding something. All of the strings that I have checked have the following parameters:

-one hyphen
-two As separated by one character, as in AEA
-two Bs separated by two characters, as in BIEB
-two Cs separated by three characters, as in CGB-C
-...
-two Zs separated by twenty-six characters, (no example given due to challenge)
-all strings are 53 characters long

In about 25 minutes time elapsed, my program has logged over 30,000 such strings into its output file.

[R. Gerbicz]

Originally Posted by EdH

If this is true, I am lost in my understanding. My program found thousands of strings that satisfy my understanding of the solution, before I CTRL-C'd it.

I await further understanding...

Edit: I am currently letting my program run. It is nowhere near finishing, but it has found over 13000 strings at about ten minutes.

You are over complicating this, submit one string + your code, he doesn't need all solutions... And actually I've used "return 0;" in the main routine after it printed the first found solution.

[EdH]

Originally Posted by science_man_88

I made an error in my own solution but logic dictates that solutions come in pairs. I came up with my solution using notepad and a few logically reasoned ideas.

And that may be where I am not doing this properly by writing a program rather than reasoning it out...

[EdH]

Originally Posted by R. Gerbicz

You are over complicating this, submit one string + your code, he doesn't need all solutions... And actually I've used "return 0;" in the main routine after it printed the first found solution.

Thanks! I sent an email with the first ten and the program. I'm just letting it run wild ATM to see what turns up, and to see if I might find a solution with only 52 characters (no hyphen) in a reasonable time.

[a1call]

Originally Posted by EdH

I was more referring to your abundance mention. I do believe I understand the challenge, yet, if you are correct about there not being many, than I may be misunderstanding something. All of the strings that I have checked have the following parameters:

-one hyphen
-two As separated by one character, as in AEA
-two Bs separated by two characters, as in BIEB
-two Cs separated by three characters, as in CGB-C
-...
-two Zs separated by twenty-six characters, (no example given due to challenge)
-all strings are 53 characters long

In about 25 minutes time elapsed, my program has logged over 30,000 such strings into its output file.

As you describe it any of the thousands would be a solution.
My statement about the abundance is just an estimate based on nothing mathematical. Essentially a guess. I don't think there are thousands of solution, but I could very easily be wrong about that.

[science_man_88]

Originally Posted by EdH

And that may be where I am not doing this properly by writing a program rather than reasoning it out...

I wish I could give a few hints that may not ruin the puzzle. oh and for a1call technically any solutions reverse is also a solution ...

[a1call]

Originally Posted by EdH

And that may be where I am not doing this properly by writing a program rather than reasoning it out...

Writing a program that finds thousands of solutions in minutes is definitely not "not doing this properly".

The only reason I moved to manually finding a solution is because there was not a chance my brute force program would find a solution in my lifetime.