General Discussions
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P1 not so bad. I tried to brute force P2 but figured i'd guess and check numbers one at a time to find the relationship between values
P2 was doing a replace on humn's value by hardcoding some numbers into an adjusted macro to spit out the results. I wrote down input/output and figured out a relationship then kept manually replacing til I got it. Took about 30 minutes of trial/error
Day 21 done! Really enjoyed today. Working back from the root and building out the solver was very fun!
Macro 1 - LookupBuilder - Iterates through expressions to work out all numbers:
Macro 2 - DependencyTree - Works back from the route to find all numbers that depend on humn:
Macro 3 - HumnSolver - Iterates backwards from the root, solving for humn:
Get the impression this was super overkill but hey ho - good macro practice!
In the first challenge, I tried to clear it by brute force, but could not.
When I reconsidered, I was able to create a concise logic.
Macro for Part1: Replace Macro
Part2: Replace Macro for Part 2: The condition for macro ending is different from part 1 macro.
Part2 : Reverse analysis Macro
The left and right sides are interchanged for analysis.
Full workflow solutions here: https://github.com/clmc9601/Advent-of-Code-solutions/tree/main/2022%20Alteryx
workflow
iterative macro
workflow
Part1:
split to data with number and equation.
build a macro to replace to equation, if the equation is solvable, add to iteration until everything solved!
part1 macro
Part2:
using method learn from neural network. add the error to the number with certain percentage.
e.g. question is: find b, when 1000 - b = 100, rate is 10%
round 1: guess b = 300, then error is 600, multiply by rate, then add 60 (600*10%) to b
round 2 will be b = 360 (300+60), then error now will be 540, multiply by rate, then add 54 (540*10%) to b
etc.
the b will slowly close to correct amount.
key is the rate can't too high as we do not know what calculation taking place.
part2 macro
:-) well over a month late and Day 21 is done.
I really liked this one - a bit of tree-logic, a bit of dynamic execution, a bit of "solve for X" - what's not to love :-)
1) Parse: get it into a flat data structure - I chose to go with a flat table with NodeName; Operand1; Operand 2; and the Operator.
2) Resolve: This is kinda like a variable resolution process in compiler theory - you take the list of nodes and break them in to 2 groups
- Where we still have variables to replace with real values
- where we have an actual value (a literal)
Then you just loop, replacing variables with literal values until you run out - and that solves part 1
3) the solve-for-x
Part 2 is kinda interesting
if you have a massive binary tree - where buried somewhere in the tree is a value that you don't know - then you do get something else for free:
- One half of the tree will completely resolve to a literal number.
- The half with the unknown value (humn) will flatten out to a simple chain of linked formulae - because anything that doesn't have the humn in it's direct parentage will just resolve to a literal number
So to do part 2:
- Remove the Human node from the set (which had a literal value in the original)
- Run part 1 - then you get a chain of one side of the tree that still needs to be resolved - all simple formulae with one known value and one unknown value
- Do a "Solve for X". for example - if you have a situation where XX = ?? + YY - then you can convert this to solve for ?? by saying that ?? = XX - YY.
- this essentially turns the chain that was left inside-out so that humn becomes the root
- Then just run your Part 1 solver again
The Tree Solver:
The Solve for X:
