Was wondering if there's an alternative for using set! in scheme/racket.
Working on assignments and we're not allowed to use set!
For one of my functions I have an incrementer
(set! count (+ count 1))
Was wondering how I would change this so that it won't make use of set!
Presumably, the reason you're not allowed to use set! is that you're being asked to solve problems in a functional way, rather than an imperative way. Let me illustrate with two different functions that both determine the length of a list:
#lang racket
(require rackunit)
(define count 0)
(define (imperative-length l)
(cond [(empty? l) count]
[else (set! count (+ 1 count))
(imperative-length (rest l))]))
(check-equal? (imperative-length '(4 3 2 1)) 4)
(define (functional-length l)
(cond [(empty? l) 0]
[else (+ 1 (functional-length (rest l)))]))
(check-equal? (functional-length '(4 3 2 1)) 4)
;; what happens if we try calling imperative-length again?
(check-equal? (imperative-length '(4 3 2 1)) 4)
;; oh no!
;; what happens if we try calling functional-length again?
(check-equal? (functional-length '(4 3 2 1)) 4)
;; yep, works fine.
Both of these functions work fine, but the functional one can be called repeatedly. But! But! you might say, I just need to remember to set the counter back to zero, or to put the binding of count inside the function. This is true, but in general, functional solutions don't require the programmer to worry about this kind of interaction at all.
So, what does this mean for you? It probably means that you need to pass the count along as another argument. Just a guess.
set! is never needed. Imagine you have this program:
(define (count lst)
(define num 0)
(define (helper lst)
(when (not (null? lst))
(set! num (+ num 1))
(helper (cdr lst))))
(helper lst)
num)
This is almost Fortran with lisp syntax. How would this be done witout set!. One way is by using boxes:
(define (count lst)
(define num (list 0))
(define (helper lst)
(when (not (null? lst))
(set-car! num (+ (car num) 1))
(helper (cdr lst))))
(helper lst)
(car num))
As explained in the SICP videos when you introduce one mutation you sort of can use that to do all types of mutation. As trivia this is a transformation that often is done by Scheme compilers so in many cases the implementations base language has set-car! and not set!. How about doing it without mutation? The trick is to shadow the binding:
(define (count lst)
(define (helper num lst)
(if (not (null? lst))
(helper (+ num 1) (cdr lst))
num))
(helper 0 lst))
This actually got simpler. Imagine you only need to update some of the variables, then you just recurse with the same ones in the other places.
Related
I'm new to racket and trying to write a function that checks if a list is in strictly ascending order.
'( 1 2 3) would return true
'(1 1 2) would return false (repeats)
'(3 2 4) would return false
My code so far is:
Image of code
(define (ascending? 'list)
(if (or (empty? list) (= (length 'list) 1)) true
(if (> first (first (rest list))) false
(ascending? (rest list)))))
I'm trying to call ascending? recursively where my base case is that the list is empty or has only 1 element (then trivially ascending).
I keep getting an error message when I use check-expect that says "application: not a procedure."
I guess you want to implement a procedure from scratch, and Alexander's answer is spot-on. But in true functional programming style, you should try to reuse existing procedures to write the solution. This is what I mean:
(define (ascending? lst)
(apply < lst))
It's shorter, simpler and easier to understand. And it works as expected!
(ascending? '(1 2 3))
=> #t
(ascending? '(1 1 2))
=> #f
Some things to consider when writing functions:
Avoid using built in functions as variable names. For example, list is a built in procedure that returns a newly allocated list, so don't use it as an argument to your function, or as a variable. A common convention/alternative is to use lst as a variable name for lists, so you could have (define (ascending? lst) ...).
Don't quote your variable names. For example, you would have (define lst '(1 2 3 ...)) and not (define 'lst '(1 2 3 ...)).
If you have multiple conditions to test (ie. more than 2), it may be cleaner to use cond rather than nesting multiple if statements.
To fix your implementation of ascending? (after replacing 'list), note on line 3 where you have (> first (first (rest list))). Here you are comparing first with (first (rest list)), but what you really want is to compare (first lst) with (first (rest lst)), so it should be (>= (first lst) (first (rest lst))).
Here is a sample implementation:
(define (ascending? lst)
(cond
[(null? lst) #t]
[(null? (cdr lst)) #t]
[(>= (car lst) (cadr lst)) #f]
[else
(ascending? (cdr lst))]))
or if you want to use first/rest and true/false you can do:
(define (ascending? lst)
(cond
[(empty? lst) true]
[(empty? (rest lst)) true]
[(>= (first lst) (first (rest lst))) false]
[else
(ascending? (rest lst))]))
For example,
> (ascending? '(1 2 3))
#t
> (ascending? '(1 1 2))
#f
> (ascending? '(3 2 4))
#f
If you write down the properties of an ascending list in bullet form;
An ascending list is either
the empty list, or
a one-element list, or
a list where
the first element is smaller than the second element, and
the tail of the list is ascending
you can wind up with a pretty straight translation:
(define (ascending? ls)
(or (null? ls)
(null? (rest ls))
(and (< (first ls) (first (rest ls)))
(ascending? (rest ls)))))
This Scheme solution uses an explicitly recursive named let and memoization:
(define (ascending? xs)
(if (null? xs) #t ; Edge case: empty list
(let asc? ((x (car xs)) ; Named `let`
(xs' (cdr xs)) )
(if (null? xs') #t
(let ((x' (car xs'))) ; Memoization of `(car xs)`
(if (< x x')
(asc? x' (cdr xs')) ; Tail recursion
#f)))))) ; Short-circuit termination
(display
(ascending?
(list 1 1 2) )) ; `#f`
I have to write a recursive macro for list addition in Common Lisp (homework). What I have so far is :
(defmacro matrix-add-row (r1 r2 sum_row)
(if (not (and r1 r2)) `sum_row
(progn
`(matrix-add-row (cdr r1) (cdr r2) (cons sum_row (+ (car r1) (car r2))))
(reverse sum_row)
)
)
)
I call this function with
(matrix-add-row `(1 2) `(3 4) ())
and as an output I get unvaluated code instead of numbers (which leads going to infinite loop).
How to put , ` properly (or call the macro properly)?
Firstly, to me this seems a rather bizarre thing to do with a macro. I assume the point is that you use the macro to transform (matrix-add-row '(1 2) '(3 4)) to an explicit list of sums like (list (+ 1 3) (+ 2 4)).
Also, what you have written has several problems which look like you don't quite understand how the backtick works. So I think the easiest way to help is to solve an example for you.
Since this is homework, I'm going to solve a different (but similar) question. You should be able to take the answer and use it for your example. Suppose I want to solve the following:
Write a macro, diffs, which computes all differences of pairs of successive elements in a list. For example,
(diffs '(1 2 3)) should expand to (list (- 2 1) (- 3 2)), which will then evaluate to (1 1).
Note that my macro won't do the actual subtraction, so I can use it even if I don't know some of the numbers until runtime. (The reason I think this sort of question is a bit weird is that it does need to know the length of the list at compile time).
My solution is going to be used as a macro with one argument but if I want to use recursion I'll need to pass in an accumulator too, which I can start with nil. So I write something like this:
(defmacro diffs (lst &optional accumulator)
...)
Now what do I do with lst? If lst is nil, I want to bottom out and just return the accumulator, with a call to list at the front, which will be code to make my list. Something like this:
(defmacro diffs (lst &optional accumulator)
(cond
((null lst)
;; You could write `(list ,#accumulator) instead, but that seems
;; unnecessarily obfuscated.
(cons 'list accumulator))
(t
(error "Aargh. Unhandled"))))
Let's try it!
CL-USER> (diffs nil)
NIL
Not hugely exciting, but it looks plausible. Now use macroexpand, which just does the expansion without the evaluation:
CL-USER> (macroexpand '(diffs nil))
(LIST)
T
And what if we'd already got some stuff from a recursion?
CL-USER> (macroexpand '(diffs nil ((- a b) (- b c))))
(LIST (- A B) (- B C))
T
Looks good! Now we need to deal with the case when there's an actual list there. The test you want is consp and (for my example) it only makes sense when there's at least two elements.
(defmacro diffs (lst &optional accumulator)
(cond
;; A list of at least two elements
((and (consp lst) (consp (cdr lst)))
(list 'diffs (cdr lst)
(cons (list '- (cadr lst) (car lst)) accumulator)))
;; A list with at most one element
((listp lst)
(cons 'list accumulator))
(t
(error "Aargh. Unhandled"))))
This seems almost to work:
CL-USER> (macroexpand '(diffs (3 4 5)))
(LIST (- 5 4) (- 4 3))
T
but for two problems:
The list comes out backwards
The code is a bit horrible when we actually construct the recursive expansion
Let's fix the second part first by using the backtick operator:
(defmacro diffs (lst &optional accumulator)
(cond
;; A list of at least two elements
((and (consp lst) (consp (cdr lst)))
`(diffs ,(cdr lst)
,(cons `(- ,(cadr lst) ,(car lst)) accumulator)))
;; A list with at most one element
((listp lst)
(cons 'list accumulator))
(t
(error "Aargh. Unhandled"))))
Hmm, it's not actually much shorter, but I think it's clearer.
For the second part, we could proceed by adding each item to the end of the accumulator rather than the front, but that's not particularly quick in Lisp because lists are singly linked. Better is to construct the accumulator backwards and then reverse it at the end:
(defmacro diffs (lst &optional accumulator)
(cond
;; A list of at least two elements
((and (consp lst) (consp (cdr lst)))
`(diffs ,(cdr lst)
,(cons `(- ,(cadr lst) ,(car lst)) accumulator)))
;; A list with at most one element
((listp lst)
(cons 'list (reverse accumulator)))
(t
(error "Aargh. Unhandled"))))
Now we get:
CL-USER> (macroexpand '(diffs (3 4 5)))
(LIST (- 4 3) (- 5 4))
T
Much better!
Two last things. Firstly, I still have an error clause in my macro. Can you see how to trigger it? Can you think of a better behaviour than just outputting an error? (Your macro is going to have to deal with the same problem)
Secondly, for debugging recursive macros like this, I recommend using macroexpand-1 which just unfolds one level at once. For example:
CL-USER> (macroexpand-1 '(diffs (3 4 5)))
(DIFFS (4 5) ((- 4 3)))
T
CL-USER> (macroexpand-1 *)
(DIFFS (5) ((- 5 4) (- 4 3)))
T
CL-USER> (macroexpand-1 *)
(LIST (- 4 3) (- 5 4))
T
There are two problems with your logic. First you are calling reverse on each iteration instead of at the end of the iteration. Then you are accumulating the new values, through cons, in the cdr of the cons cell as opposed to the car.
Also I don't see why this have to be a macro so using a function.
(defun matrix-add-row (r1 r2 sum-row)
(if (or (endp r1) (endp r2))
(reverse sum-row)
(matrix-add-row (cdr r1)
(cdr r2)
(cons (+ (car r1) (car r2))
sum-row))))
(matrix-add-row '(1 2) '(3 4) ())
;; => (4 6)
I am watching SICP video lectures and i came to a section where tutors are showing procedures to work with lists, so, here is one of them:
(define (map p l)
(if (null? l)
(list)
(cons (p (car l))
(map p (cdr l)))))
What i want to ask is: is there a way to define map in iterative way, or that cons requires lazy evaluation to be executed right?
You original code is almost tail recursive.. the only thing that makes it not is the cons part. If Scheme had equal requirement for having TRMC optimization as it has TCO requirement you could leave your code as is and the implementation would have made it tail recursive for you.
Since it isn't a requirement we need to do our own TRMC optimization. Usually when iterating a list in a loop and having it tail recursive by using an accumulator you get the result in the opposite order, thus you can do linear update reverse:
(define (map proc lst)
(let loop ((lst lst) (acc '()))
(cond ((null? lst) (reverse! acc) acc)
(else (loop (cdr lst)
(cons (proc (car lst)) acc))))))
Or you can do it all in one pass:
(define (map proc lst)
(define head (list 1))
(let loop ((tail head) (lst lst))
(cond ((null? lst) (cdr head))
(else (set-cdr! tail (list (proc (car lst))))
(loop (cdr tail) (cdr lst))))))
Now in both cases you mutate only the structure the procedure has itself created, thus for the user it might as well be implemented in the same manner as your example.
When you use higher order procedures like map from your implementation it could happen it has been implemented like this. It's easy to find out by comparing performance on the supplied map with the different implementations with a very long list. The difference between the executions would tell you if it's TRMCO or how the supplied map probably has been implemented.
You need to embrace recursion in order to appreciate SICP and Scheme in general, so try to get used to it, you will appreciate it later, promised.
But yes, you can:
(define (iterative-map f lst)
(define res null)
(do ((i (- (length lst) 1) (- i 1))) ((= i -1))
(set! res (cons (f (list-ref lst i)) res)))
res)
(iterative-map (lambda (x) (+ x 1)) '(1 3 5))
=> '(2 4 6)
but using set! is considered bad style if avoidable.
In Racket you have a different set of loops that are more elegant:
(define (for-map f lst)
(for/list ((i lst))
(f i)))
(for-map add1 '(1 3 5))
=> '(2 4 6)
First off, this is homework, but I am simply looking for a hint or pseudocode on how to do this.
I need to sum all the items in the list, using recursion. However, it needs to return the empty set if it encounters something in the list that is not a number. Here is my attempt:
(DEFINE sum-list
(LAMBDA (lst)
(IF (OR (NULL? lst) (NOT (NUMBER? (CAR lst))))
'()
(+
(CAR lst)
(sum-list (CDR lst))
)
)
)
)
This fails because it can't add the empty set to something else. Normally I would just return 0 if its not a number and keep processing the list.
I suggest you use and return an accumulator for storing the sum; if you find a non-number while traversing the list you can return the empty list immediately, otherwise the recursion continues until the list is exhausted.
Something along these lines (fill in the blanks!):
(define sum-list
(lambda (lst acc)
(cond ((null? lst) ???)
((not (number? (car lst))) ???)
(else (sum-list (cdr lst) ???)))))
(sum-list '(1 2 3 4 5) 0)
> 15
(sum-list '(1 2 x 4 5) 0)
> ()
I'd go for this:
(define (mysum lst)
(let loop ((lst lst) (accum 0))
(cond
((empty? lst) accum)
((not (number? (car lst))) '())
(else (loop (cdr lst) (+ accum (car lst)))))))
Your issue is that you need to use cond, not if - there are three possible branches that you need to consider. The first is if you run into a non-number, the second is when you run into the end of the list, and the third is when you need to recurse to the next element of the list. The first issue is that you are combining the non-number case and the empty-list case, which need to return different values. The recursive case is mostly correct, but you will have to check the return value, since the recursive call can return an empty list.
Because I'm not smart enough to figure out how to do this in one function, let's be painfully explicit:
#lang racket
; This checks the entire list for numericness
(define is-numeric-list?
(lambda (lst)
(cond
((null? lst) true)
((not (number? (car lst))) false)
(else (is-numeric-list? (cdr lst))))))
; This naively sums the list, and will fail if there are problems
(define sum-list-naive
(lambda (lst)
(cond
((null? lst) 0)
(else (+ (car lst) (sum-list-naive (cdr lst)))))))
; This is a smarter sum-list that first checks numericness, and then
; calls the naive version. Note that this is inefficient, because the
; entire list is traversed twice: once for the check, and a second time
; for the sum. Oscar's accumulator version is better!
(define sum-list
(lambda (lst)
(cond
((is-numeric-list? lst) (sum-list-naive lst))
(else '()))))
(is-numeric-list? '(1 2 3 4 5))
(is-numeric-list? '(1 2 x 4 5))
(sum-list '(1 2 3 4 5))
(sum-list '(1 2 x 4 5))
Output:
Welcome to DrRacket, version 5.2 [3m].
Language: racket; memory limit: 128 MB.
#t
#f
15
'()
>
I suspect your homework is expecting something more academic though.
Try making a "is-any-nonnumeric" function (using recursion); then you just (or (is-any-numeric list) (sum list)) tomfoolery.
With the following code, I get #<CompilerException java.lang.UnsupportedOperationException: Can only recur from tail position (NO_SOURCE_FILE:4)> despite the fact that all recurs are in tail positions. If I remove the recur from the one-argument version, it stops complaining. Why is this happening?
(defn remove-duplicates "Removes duplicate elements of lst.
For example, given (1 2 3 1 4 1 2), remove-duplicates returns a sequence
containing the elements (1 2 3 4), in some order."
[lst] (recur (rest lst) (set (first lst)))
[lst uniques] (cond (zero? (count lst)) uniques
:else (cond
(some (partial = (first lst)) uniques)
(recur (rest lst) uniques)
:else
(recur (rest lst) (first lst)))))
You haven't split up the multi-arity bodies right. Should read (defn foo ([x] (...)) ([x y] (...))). This causes the compiler to think you're doing totally different stuff, which probably accounts for your issue.
First of all: you know that all you want is (def remove-duplicates set) or -- if you want a vector -- (def remove-duplicates-vec (comp vec set)), right?
Five things here:
As amalloy noticed, you should've added parens
As kotarak noticed, you can't recur between arities
You can't call (set (first lst)) because set wants coll. If you want, do something like (set (vector (first [1 2 3 2 3]))) but this is neither pretty nor idiomatic
Doing (cond pred1 code1 :else (cond pred2a code2a :else code2b)) could be made simplier: (cond pred1 code1 pred2a code2a :else code2b) -- what you did is treated cond macro as if it were if (which is a built-in as far as I know)
Your last tail-call is also wrong. Assume we've started with [1 2 3 2 1]
When you call it first you have following arguments: ([2 3 2 1] #{1}) (I've skipped the boring part)
Then you have last predicate true, so you go with ([3 2 1] 2) and this is obviously wrong because you wanted ([3 2 1] #{1 2}). You probably want to call (recur (rest lst) (conj uniques (first lst)))
Summing up:
(defn remove-duplicates
([lst] (remove-duplicates (rest lst) #{(first coll)}))
([lst uniques]
(cond
(zero? (count lst)) uniques
(some (partial = (first lst)) uniques)
(recur (rest lst) uniques)
:else
(recur (rest lst) (conj uniques (first lst))))))