@PhiNotPi isn't this the job of functions, not IDEs?

@NathanMerrill That still requires me to manually write a function though.

Obviously, somebody has to write it first

but once it is written (hopefully not by you) you should ideally be able to combine functions to get exactly what you need

I don't want my IDE to write out my sorting algorithm: just give me a sort function to do it for me

and I can pass in a cmp() or key() to do exactly what I need

Yeah I get that nobody would really use this tool for day-to-day work, the whole point was if you wanted to make your whole algorithm explicit.

ah, gotcha. Perhaps a tool that can "expand" the algorithm

similar to how compilers inline function calls

A non-insignificant number of these made me chuckle: mathwithbaddrawings.com/2018/10/31/im-going-on-a-random-walk

@El'endiaStarman Those are good

I don't get the zorro one:

I do get the e^pi*i +1 == 0, but I don't get zorro

My wife and I literally just watched The Mask of Zorro a few days ago.

(I knew about the movie since I'd seen it many years ago. It's from 1998 and is one of the latest movies in a long list. Most Zorro content is meant for Hispanic audiences so it's not as well-known in the US.)

Ah

This is the trailer and it starts with Zorro's signature z-slash.

So browsing the HNQ, I learned that chess has a 50 move rule, which basically means that if 50 turns elapse, and 1) No pawns have moved, and 2) No pieces have been captured, then the game is a draw.

Of course, this begs the question: If both players work together, what is the theoretical longest possible game of chess according to this rule?

Oh yeah, one other important rule that's relevant to the question: If the game reaches any state 3 times, that is also a draw

Hypothetically, all black pawns can make 4 moves before running into the white line, and white pawns can make 6 moves before being promoted, so that's 6 * 8 * 50 + 4 * 8 * 50 == 1600 + 2400 == 4000 moves.

And then there are 14 other pieces that can make a practically infinite number of moves, so thats 14 * 50 == 700 more moves before they're all captured

Problem is, if you're moving the pawns that slowly, I you might hit duplicate states before you can make the 50 moves and advance a single pawn

I'm not sure about that though

But if my reasoning is correct, the upper limit should be 4750 moves?

I think the pawn situation is a little more complicated. You wouldn't want to capture any pawns under any circumstances, i would sacrifice pieces to allow pawns to move around each other.

Oh, so then every pawn gets promoted

I don't think the 3x repetition rule is an issue, as long as you have a single free piece the configuration space is pretty big.

OK, so each of the 16 pawns can wait 50 turns before making one of their 6 moves and being promoted. 16 * 6 * 50 = 4800. Each of the 30 non-king pieces can then wait 50 moves before being captured, so 16 * 6 * 50 + 30 * 50 == 6300

Plus another 50 to wait for the draw

Are you calculating that with 0 captures? Each capture resets the 50-move rule as well.

I know.

> Each of the 30 non-king pieces can then wait 50 moves before being captured,

Oh, I didn't see 'captured' in there.

Although apparently King V King is also an automatic draw. Lame

Well, of course it is.

Could pose it as a PPCG challenge!

"Do as many chess moves as possible without drawing."

king-of-the-hill ?

Ooh, even better. Your score is "number of moves in your game - length of your source code" :D

Nah, KotH doesn't really make sense to me. I was just thinking a plain code-challenge where your score is the total number of moves executed.