ikegami:
Thanks for the tip on the speed boost. Once I get the benchmarking stuff installed I'll play with it. While I do like your suggestion, I prefer the order that my method generates--all one-word combinations first, then the two-word combinations, etc.)
Re: shoddy code. Yeah, I guess so, consider me properly admonished. ++ for calling me on it and keeping me honest. When I thunk up the technique to use, I just erased the original function body and started whacking away at it. I didn't think to clarify things by using better variable names. (Of course, I just came off of a little golfing trip so my head was in "trim keystrokes" mode.</lame_excuse_mode>) Now, I guess the proper thing to do is to clean it up a little and insert your suggestion, so here goes:
<pedagogical_mode>
sub function {
my @parts = split /:/, shift;
# Null is the complete list of combinations for
# an empty word list
my @combinations=();
# Sequentially (recursively with tail recursion
# removed) rebuild the combination list adding one
# new word each iteration
for my $new_word (@parts) {
# Given a complete set of combinations for a
# given list of words, we can add a new word to
# the list and generate all new valid combinations
# by concatenating to the original list:
push @combinations,
# the new word (a single word is a valid
# combination)
$new_word,
# and the original list with the new word
# glommed onto the end of each member
map {$_.':'.$new_word} @combinations
;
}
return @combinations;
}
</pedagogical_mode>
--roboticus |