Advent of Code

Redwolf Programs

04:36

Wonder if our submarine will get eaten by a whale at any point in our journey

(If that's what today's lore is y'all owe me a +500 bounty :p)

20m

The Fifth Marshal

The entire premise of the story is that we escaped a whale, though

Redwolf Programs

Wait it is

I haven't paid any attention lol

The Fifth Marshal

See Day 7

Redwolf Programs

Maybe the cave is actually the whale's intestines and we've been eaten already loooong ago

The Fifth Marshal

And thus the crabs betrayed us? Why would they do that?

Redwolf Programs

04:42

For the money

All crabs love money

The Fifth Marshal

And how could the whale smash the mouth of its own body (from the beginning of Day 8)

And why would there be lava tubes inside a whale? (from Day 9)

Redwolf Programs

Yeah yeah, don't ruin my AoC headcanon :p

The Fifth Marshal

Or live octopuses? (From Day 11)

Or a maze of caves? (From Day 12)

Or active volcanoes (From Day 13)

Quite simply, the entire idea makes no sense if you pay any attention at all to the story

Redwolf Programs

I know, I know, it was not a serious suggestion lol

The Fifth Marshal

Then again, if you had told be there would be bugs expanding in folded space on Eris (from 2019 day 24), I would likely have rejected it out of hand in the same manner.

So, Advent of Code often makes little sense, but your "we're all inside a whale" hack makes even less sense

And, remember, we have infinite plot armor; we (or, at least, those of us who solve all the puzzles) will find the keys by day 25

Redwolf Programs

04:47

@TheFifthMarshal Once again, it was a joke

The point is that it's a ridiculous suggestion

10m

The Fifth Marshal

7m

lyxal

dah frick I have to speedrun getting the vyxal flask app running again

Redwolf Programs

Oops that reminds me I need to fix my server

I'll probably just go shut it off after AoC

And do it tomorrow morning

lyxal

there we go

all done

the joys of localhost

Redwolf Programs

6

lyxal

04:56

can't wait for whatever 2d thinking they make us do today

Redwolf Programs

Can't wait for 6d GoL

Unrelated String

bold of you to assume there will only be two dimensions

Redwolf Programs

ninja'd you :p

sort of

3

Unrelated String

oh yeah what year was it we had fucking
increasing dimensions gol

that was fun

or some cellular automaton

Redwolf Programs

Better than GoL-but-the-number-of-dimensions-increase-after-every-step

The Fifth Marshal

04:58

Increasing dimensions of game of life was 2020 day 17

Redwolf Programs

Do you have these memorized? :p

emanresu A

2

Redwolf Programs

1m, glhf!

Unrelated String

i really need to find that microfiber cloth so i can clean my screen

the dust is way too visible with a desk light on

lyxal

so basically this is just regex substitution in a way

or at least insertion

hyper-neutrino

05:08

2/19

brain not working well enough for good p2 time

like i immediately knew what i needed to do but i lost a lot of time figuring out how to do the final counting

100pts until #3, gained 27pts on ecner

emanresu A

Ok unnaive approach time

(I knew it)

Redwolf Programs

I'm a sussy baaka

lyxal

*baka

only one a

Unrelated String

i really need to actually use defaultdicts

tjjfvi

adventofsettingupmycomputerattheverylastminutebeforeadventofcod…

hyper-neutrino

05:16

same but i never remember where to import them from or how to use them

i actually think i've legitimately never used one before

@tjjfvi F

tjjfvi

Got 104 on part 2; I probably could've scored some points if I hadn't been delayed :/

Redwolf Programs

Part 2 is hard

Am I doing it wrong?

lyxal

adventofwhyismycomputerlagging.com

Unrelated String

why didn't i realize earlier that i'm just double counting
...and why didn't i realize earlier that python operator precedence needs parentheses if i want to correct for it as hackily as possible

111/267 :/

emanresu A

I've done some stuff for p2 but now I'm unsure how to count single elements

I have a dict of {pair:count}

Unrelated String

05:21

oh yeah and of course that's why i was double counting

lyxal

@emanresuA imagine using a dictionary.

Unrelated String

of course it didn't help that i initially just took the max and min pair counts lmao

Redwolf Programs

26/500 lol

I'm on the leaderboard!

hyper-neutrino

:D

btnlq

the first and the last symbols in my polymer template are equal, lost 2 minutes on this

Redwolf Programs

05:23

Don't know why p2 was so tricky for me...

lyxal

so uh question: what does the non-naive/quick way involve?

Redwolf Programs

I had an off-by-one, for one

@lyxal Dictionary of the pairs

Unrelated String

ayy

lyxal

@RedwolfPrograms so basically I can't do quick way today. Dang.

Unrelated String

you shouldn't have enough distinct pairs that you need the performance of a proper hash map

Redwolf Programs

05:24

Not sure how I did p2 so slowly

Unrelated String

i think you could use matrix multiplication if you really wanted

lyxal

that takes over 2 minutes for the actual input

Redwolf Programs

Y'all had to increment the first and last letter's counts for p2, right?

lyxal

probably over 3 or 4

Unrelated String

i did not

Redwolf Programs

05:25

Did I just get unlucky with an input that caused an off-by-one?

Since you do need to do that to get correct counts for those with my method

Unrelated String

you might have gotten unlucky with one of them being the min or max

Redwolf Programs

Yeah

lyxal

.... p2 requires 40 steps

fml

Unrelated String

yes

lyxal

took 4 minutes for p1 to finish

and that's just 10

Unrelated String

05:26

rip

Redwolf Programs

Debugging that cost me probably like 300 places but I don't fcking care lol

Unrelated String

lol

btnlq

@UnrelatedString or both...

Unrelated String

the debugging in this shit is a wild, wild ride

hyper-neutrino

this is how i ended up turning the pair counts into the final answer

because i never realized the first and last chars will be static

kekw

Unrelated String

05:27

oh good so i'm not alone in not using defaultdicts or counters

lol

Redwolf Programs

This was a pretty fun one

Unrelated String

also i just used the .values() of my char count dict

Redwolf Programs

Same :p

hyper-neutrino

same

Redwolf Programs

Here's my p2, keep in mind there are some library functions used

hyper-neutrino

05:29

> p2-without-library.js

> keep in mind there are some library functions used

Redwolf Programs

(counts, rules, and a few other vars were already declared)

hyper-neutrino

what other lies have I been told by the council

Redwolf Programs

@hyper-neutrino As in without the library code :p

Unrelated String

worry not, i can't read js to begin with

hyper-neutrino

if p[0] + q not in npc: npc[p[0] + q] = 0
npc[p[0] + q] += pc[p]
if q + p[1] not in npc: npc[q + p[1]] = 0
npc[q + p[1]] += pc[p]

Unrelated String

05:29

wait do you actually havce the library code directly in your sols

hyper-neutrino

i really need to use default dict

Unrelated String

yeah

hyper-neutrino

i also need to get better brain cells

Unrelated String

also in this case apparently there's also Counter

Redwolf Programs

@UnrelatedString No, it's 1k sloc so I paste it in separately

hyper-neutrino

05:30

could just for x, y in pc instead of for p in pc to save on the p[0] p[1] shit

Redwolf Programs

@RedwolfPrograms Wait no, just 1k loc

Unrelated String

i thought Counter was the thing from itertools for just counting up infinitely but i guess not

Redwolf Programs

Probably like 400 sloc since I overuse blank lines

emanresu A

Ugh bugs in code

Unrelated String

@hyper-neutrino i'm legitimately allergic to bracket indexing at this point lmao

slicing? fine
getting individual values? unlikely

Redwolf Programs

05:32

Taking my time and actually reading the challenges has made this a lot more fun

Unrelated String

yeah

hyper-neutrino

yeah I agree

Redwolf Programs

I made so many stupid mistakes due to not reading stuff right

hyper-neutrino

it's started feeling more like "can I find a good solution quickly" not "can i rush out my impl and type fast without reading half the question"

like when the speed starts coming from experience with problem solving and not experience skipping irrelevant flavortext in AoC problems

it becomes a lot more balanced and enjoyable

Unrelated String

honestly wonder if i'd have been able to do star 1 faster if i'd taken a second to think of the non-naive implementation

Redwolf Programs

05:34

Yeah. I missed that transition by a few days, and totally threw the first few times it got tough

Which was like two days ago lol

hyper-neutrino

i missed it by 1 day and ended up doing comparatively worse because i misread shit a ton

emanresu A

Oh no, my counting, it's broken

hyper-neutrino

oh yeah it was the flash problem i think?

Redwolf Programs

Day       Time  Rank  Score       Time  Rank  Score
 14   00:03:43    26     75   00:22:44   530      0
 13   00:05:04    45     56   00:11:06   155      0
 12   00:15:49   960      0   00:59:30  3322      0
 11   00:31:51  2785      0   00:35:56  2725      0
 10   00:05:52   409      0   00:09:34   194      0
  9   00:04:32   213      0   00:11:07   114      0
  8   00:03:31    74     27   00:17:36    60     41
  7   00:01:40    67     34   00:03:47   139      0
  6   00:02:19    27     74   00:04:57    56     45

hyper-neutrino

TBCH

Unrelated String

05:34

because any time there's a fixed number of iterations for something where a naive solution grows something in memory you pretty much know you have to do something more clever

hyper-neutrino

the non-naive impl isn't even harder

if i did it from the start

Unrelated String

it's legit easier

hyper-neutrino

i would've gotten fewer points almost certainly

Unrelated String

aside from making sure you don't fuck up counting at the end

hyper-neutrino

^

yeah that was what got me for p2

but here's the thing

Redwolf Programs

05:35

The counting at the end really made me think

hyper-neutrino

wasting a minute on p2 might lose you like 5-10 places

emanresu A

@UnrelatedString How did y'all do it?

hyper-neutrino

wasting a minute on p1 will lose you like 30-50 places

emanresu A

(Because I've got a dict of pair counts)

Unrelated String

yeah

hyper-neutrino

05:36

so i'd rather spend extra time doing p2 instead of saving overall time doing them together, because it's better for ranking

Redwolf Programs

@emanresuA You can just add up the counts of the characters in the pairs, increment the first and last, and divde them all by two

Unrelated String

@emanresuA i just added pair counts for each character then divided the final result by 2

and yeah you might need to handle the first/last issue

Redwolf Programs

If you're unlucky, ^ will give you an off-by-one (speaking from experience :( )

The Fifth Marshal

I submitted an incorrect answer for the first time today

Unrelated String

you could ceiling divide perhaps

emanresu A

05:36

Ok...

Unrelated String

actually no if the min is missing one but not the max

ugh

Redwolf Programs

I tried ceiling divide once, but got all dizzy and did it at my desk instead

Unrelated String

ceiling divide the min and max independently

lyxal

6 minutes into running p2 and still isn't finished

Redwolf Programs

You're not doing it the naive way are you

That would be sus

The Fifth Marshal

05:38

And, ugh, my code works for the sample but fails on the puzzle input

lyxal

depends on what you mean by naive

The Fifth Marshal

(and it's not just an off-by-one)

Redwolf Programs

@lyxal As in the p1 solution

lyxal

dang

emanresu A

FRICK leading newlines in the rules

lyxal

05:39

just realised I ran 10 steps instead of 40

6 minutes for nothing

@RedwolfPrograms maybe I am...

Redwolf Programs

It grows exponentially

lyxal

no duh

Redwolf Programs

And I had 20 KiB by step 10

You're probably not going to live long enough to do p2 the naive way :p

lyxal

so then what's the non-naive solution that doesn't involve dictionaries/hashmaps?

Redwolf Programs

Simulate a dictionary with an array of pairs

Unrelated String

05:40

i'm going to do this in jelly now

lyxal

@RedwolfPrograms and then what?

Unrelated String

that

lyxal

no but like okay so say there's a dictionary workaround. What do i do with said dictionary?

emanresu A

@RedwolfPrograms More like an off-by-.5 error

Redwolf Programs

All non-negative numbers that aren't 0 or Infinity are roughly the same as 1

emanresu A

05:48

ಠ_ಠ I had a working piece of code 20 minutes ago but broke it

916/2114

First sub-1k in a while

Redwolf Programs

Nice!

emanresu A

Lol 5k people are still working on p2

Redwolf Programs

Yeah, it's tough if you don't already know roughly what to do

emanresu A

Code

The Fifth Marshal

I spent about half an hour debugging a one-character typo

Anyway, done 230/2679

The typo was, if anyone is interested, a = where I should have had a +=

Redwolf Programs

05:58

I love how all of our p2 rankings are like 10x higher than our p1s

Unrelated String

lol

even hyper's is nearly 10x going from 2 to 19 lmao

mine only more than doubled 😎

Redwolf Programs

Dec 4 at 5:27, by Redwolf Programs

I feel an odd sense of comraderie in our collective failure to do that part right :p

emanresu A

@UnrelatedString Same lol

Redwolf Programs

Mine was like 20x higher lol

26 to 500

emanresu A

On the private leaderboard I'm stuck at #14

Razetime

07:09

fuck yeah got part 2

Unrelated String

just as I finished doing it in Jelly

~~and it only takes 21 seconds on my input~~

2 hours ago, by Unrelated String

i think you could use matrix multiplication if you really wanted

Razetime

@UnrelatedString i got delayed by an exam

Unrelated String

rip

Razetime

ooo matrix transform?

Unrelated String

yep lmao

Razetime

07:19

raise to the 40th power i guess

wonder how long it took to figure that out

Unrelated String

lyxal was asking how to do it without dictionaries, so... yeah

Razetime

i did it without dictionaries storing a bunch of arrays

Unrelated String

that was the main alternative mentioned

Razetime

one for the pair occurrences and one for letter occurrences

Unrelated String

and it should be pretty performant because you only have a constant number of distinct pairs you're keeping counts for

hyper-neutrino

07:22

oh yeah you could definitely do this with matrix transform

gimme a bit

Unrelated String

12 mins ago, by Unrelated String

just as I finished doing it in Jelly

hyper-neutrino

wait that was a matrix thing?

oh

lol i didn't feel like reading that much jelly

Razetime

well if it's a boolean matrix you can pull some math trick to use very little exponentiation

hyper-neutrino

hm

Unrelated String

it should be so long as there aren't rules of the form XX -> X but if there are then there could be entries with value 2

or would rather

actually come to think of it i think my code makes that assumption anyways

Unrelated String

11:44

(both my jelly and my python; i used a completely gratuitous set to store the pairs each pair results in)

Transcript for