lceb - a Countdown solver in C.

lceb will find the best solutions(s) for the Numbers part of the Countdown game "Le compte est Bon" in French).

Get the source

git clone https://git.bodiccea.tk/bruno/Le-Compte-est-Bon.git

Build

To display more debug information, you may first enable some DEBUG flags in the Makefile. I usually use the -DDEBUG, -DDEBUG_MAIN, and -DDEBUG_MEM, as below

CFLAGS:=$(CFLAGS) -DDEBUG              #     general (signal handler, etc...)
CFLAGS:=$(CFLAGS) -DDEBUG_MAIN         #     general information in main
#CFLAGS:=$(CFLAGS) -DDEBUG_MAINSLEEP    #     sleep 1 sec within main loop (SIGINTR test)
#CFLAGS:=$(CFLAGS) -DDEBUG_MAINLOOP     #     main loop (do not use this!)
#CFLAGS:=$(CFLAGS) -DDEBUG_TIMER        #     timer
#CFLAGS:=$(CFLAGS) -DDEBUG_SIGNAL       #     signal
#CFLAGS:=$(CFLAGS) -DDEBUG_BEST         #     best control
#CFLAGS:=$(CFLAGS) -DDEBUG_TREE         #     tree
#CFLAGS:=$(CFLAGS) -DDEBUG_OPER         #     oper
#CFLAGS:=$(CFLAGS) -DDEBUG_STACK        #     stack
#CFLAGS:=$(CFLAGS) -DDEBUG_STACK2       #     stack - more details
#CFLAGS:=$(CFLAGS) -DDEBUG_EVAL         #     eval
#CFLAGS:=$(CFLAGS) -DDEBUG_EVAL2        #     eval 2
#CFLAGS:=$(CFLAGS) -DDEBUG_EVAL3        #     eval 3
CFLAGS:=$(CFLAGS) -DDEBUG_MEM          #     malloc

To build the binaries just run:

$ make lceb

Usage

basic usage and output

$ ./lceb 2 7 1 7 8 8
timer started...
mem: allocating operators working area (5 bytes)
new_stack: allocating 1024 stacks
get_node: allocating 1024 new nodes - total nodes=1024
target assigned (2).
SIGINT armed.
stacks          :             30
ops combinations:            256
trees           :             14
max evaluations :        537,600
Le compte est bon: 5 solutions with 2 ops (1st after 0.00030 secs).
1 8 7 - +
1 8 8 / +g
1 7 7 / +
1 8 + 7 -
8 7 1 - -
Total time elapsed: 0.01327 secs, nodes/leaves evaluated:401,817/397,973

lceb takes at least 3 arguments: target number (the one to find), and from 2 to 6 use-able numbers. The solutions are displayed by default in RPN notation (here 1 8 7 - + means (8-7)+1).

options

You can see the available options with lceb -h:

$ ./lceb -h
usage: ./lceb [options] target n1 n2 [...n6]
Countdown game solver.
  -1: Show only one solution (immediate stop when exact solution found
  -c: Show solutions timer
  -d TYPE: Solutions display type. TYPE can be:
           r: RPN (default)
           p: Polish
           l: Lisp (binary operators)
           i: Infix (full parentheses)
           d: Suitable for dc(1) input
           t: Tree
  -i: Show intermediate solutions
  -s: Do not show summary (time, nodes evaluated)
  -t: Use less trees (Wedderburn–Etherington instead of Catalan)
  -T TIMER: Will stop after TIMER 1/10th seconds
  -h: This help

the -t option

Using -t gives a large performance boost. Compare the two output below :

$ ./lceb -di -c 997 4 8 25 2 5 3
timer started...
mem: allocating operators working area (6 bytes)
new_stack: allocating 1024 stacks
get_node: allocating 1024 new nodes - total nodes=1024
target assigned (997).
SIGINT armed.
stacks          :            720
ops combinations:          1,024
trees           :             42
max evaluations :    185,794,560
get_node: allocating 1024 new nodes - total nodes=2048
get_node: allocating 1024 new nodes - total nodes=3072
get_node: allocating 1024 new nodes - total nodes=4096
get_node: allocating 1024 new nodes - total nodes=5120
Le compte est bon: 3 solutions with 3 ops (1st after 0.00841 secs).
0.00841 secs: (((5 * 8) * 25) - 3)
0.00841 secs: (((5 * 25) * 8) - 3)
0.00841 secs: (((8 * 25) * 5) - 3)
Total time elapsed: 3.40713 secs, nodes/leaves evaluated:138,979,332/132,474,697

$ ./lceb -di -t -c 997 4 8 25 2 5 3
timer started...
mem: allocating operators working area (6 bytes)
new_stack: allocating 1024 stacks
get_node: allocating 1024 new nodes - total nodes=1024
target assigned (997).
SIGINT armed.
stacks          :            720
ops combinations:          1,024
trees           :              6
max evaluations :     26,542,080
get_node: allocating 1024 new nodes - total nodes=2048
Le compte est bon: 3 solutions with 3 ops (1st after 0.15392 secs).
0.15392 secs: (((5 * 8) * 25) - 3)
0.15392 secs: (((5 * 25) * 8) - 3)
0.15393 secs: (((8 * 25) * 5) - 3)
Total time elapsed: 0.47460 secs, nodes/leaves evaluated:18,793,369/18,650,735

It should be noted that having general performance improvement does not mean that the first solution will be found sooner.

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