I wanted to try creating a console app that could give me the results of evaluating the Collatz conjecture with several different numbers, but when the program runs up to 113,000 the numbers stop calculating.
In order to do so, I used a (double,int) for calculations.
Here is my reasoning:
if an odd double is divided by 2, you will get a decimal: 2.3,2.4,2.5, and so on; however, if an odd integer is divided by 2 you will get another integer. Using this knowledge, if a number is odd, then the decimal version of the number will not be equal to the integer version.
However, after doing a few tests, I found that the numbers stopped at 113,000. When the max for integers and doubles should be higher.
These are the results.
[1]: https://i.stack.imgur.com/xdHpT.png
The following code bellow checks if a number is even or odd. If the number is even, the number is divided by two, and if the number is odd, the number is multiplied by three and added by 1.
There are no errors listed in the debug screen. My expected result is for the list of numbers to continue up to the int maximum.
static (double,int) Checker(double n1, int n2)
{
double newn1 = n1;
int newn2 = n2;
if(n1/2==n2/2)
{
newn1 = n1 / 2;
newn2 = n2 / 2;
}
else
{
newn1 = (n1 * 3) + 1;
newn2 = (n2 * 3) + 1;
}
return (newn1,newn2);
}
The part of code below ensures that each number is calculated using the Collatz conjecture until a result of 1 is released or j = (1,1)
static void Main(string[] args)
{
int v = 2;
int timer = 1;
int savedv = 1;
bool run = true;
bool reached = false;
(double, int) j;
j.Item2 = -5;
j.Item1 = 0;
while (1 == 1)
{
while (1==1)
{
while (reached == false)
{
if (timer == 1)
{ savedv = v;
}
j = Checker(v, v);
v = j.Item2;
timer += 1;
if (j == (1, 1))
{
v = savedv;
reached = true;
}
}
if (reached == true)
{
Console.WriteLine("The number" + " " + v + " " + "follows the sequence, and 1 was reached on a timer of" + " "+ timer +"\n" + "Total steps:"+" " + (timer-1));
v += 1;
timer = 1;
reached = false;
}
}
}
}
The core problem you're hitting is that Collatz(113383) has an intermediate value that surpasses Int32.MaxVaue.
Here's a simpler & faster implementation to demonstrate that point;
private static void Collatz()
{
for (ulong i = 1; ; i++)
{
var j = i;
var steps = 0;
while (j != 1)
{
steps++;
if ((j & 1) == 0)
j = j >> 1;
else
{
j = (j << 1) + j + 1; // *3 via shifting * addition
if (j >= Int32.MaxValue)
break;
}
}
if ((i%10000) == 0 || j != 1)
Console.WriteLine($"{i} hit {j} after {steps} steps");
if (j != 1)
break;
}
}
Outputs;
10000 hit 1 after 29 steps
20000 hit 1 after 30 steps
30000 hit 1 after 178 steps
40000 hit 1 after 31 steps
50000 hit 1 after 127 steps
60000 hit 1 after 179 steps
70000 hit 1 after 81 steps
80000 hit 1 after 32 steps
90000 hit 1 after 164 steps
100000 hit 1 after 128 steps
110000 hit 1 after 92 steps
113383 hit 2482111348 after 120 steps
I just started to learn C# and only know really basic stuff. So this question may be easy to you, but very hard to me. The more detail in your answer, the better.
The next line of code will check if a studentnumber is real or fake. The number is real when the sum of all the characters (when multiplied by their place number) are a multiple of 11.
Console.WriteLine("What is your studentnumber?");
stnum = Console.ReadLine();
var stnumint = Convert.ToInt32(stnum);
var ans1 = (stnumint % 10 - stnumint % 1) / 1;
var ans2 = (stnumint % 100 - stnumint % 10) / 10;
var ans3 = (stnumint % 1000 - stnumint % 100) / 100;
var ans4 = (stnumint % 10000 - stnumint % 1000) / 1000;
var ans5 = (stnumint % 100000 - stnumint % 10000) / 10000;
var ans6 = (stnumint % 1000000 - stnumint % 100000) / 100000;
var ans7 = (stnumint % 10000000 - stnumint % 1000000) / 1000000;
var control = ans1 * 1 + ans2 * 2 + ans3 * 3 + ans4 * 4 + ans5 * 5 + ans6 * 6 + ans7 * 7;
var endnum = control % 11;
if (endnum == 0)
{
Console.WriteLine("You have got a valid studentnumber.");
}
else
{
Console.WriteLine("Check if your studentnumber is correct. If it is, you are not a student.");
}
Take for example studentnumber 9232753. When calculating: (9*7 + 2*6 + 3*5 + 2*4 + 7*3 + 5*2 + 3*1) % 11, the answer will be 0.
How can I write this line of code into a smaller loop?
One equivalent loop would be:
int control = 0;
int power10 = 1; // var to save an expensive `Math.Power` call
for (int i = 1; i <= 7; i++)
{
control += ((stnumint % (power10*10) - stnumint % power10) / power10) * i;
power10 *= 10;
}
I would highly recommend not using var for built-in types like int, string, etc. You leave the resulting type at the mercy of the compiler which can give you unexpected results. Save var for when the actual type is difficult (or impossible) to determine at design-time.
var totalAns = 0;
for (int i = 1; i <= 10000000; i *= 10)
{
ans += (stnumint % (10*i) - stnumint % i) / i;
}
Here is the part for calculation. If you need to save stnumint, copy it another variable.
int stnumint=...; //must be sure, that data type is n
int checksum=0;
int i=1;
while(stnumint>0)
{
checksum=(stnumint%10)*i;
i++;
//in real numbers will look like floor(stnumint/10)
//will automaticly floor because of data type int
stnumint=stnumint/10;
}
In C#, what's the best way to get the 1st digit in an int? The method I came up with is to turn the int into a string, find the 1st char of the string, then turn it back to an int.
int start = Convert.ToInt32(curr.ToString().Substring(0, 1));
While this does the job, it feels like there is probably a good, simple, math-based solution to such a problem. String manipulation feels clunky.
Edit: irrespective of speed differences, mystring[0] instead of Substring() is still just string manipulation
Benchmarks
Firstly, you must decide on what you mean by "best" solution, of course that takes into account the efficiency of the algorithm, its readability/maintainability, and the likelihood of bugs creeping up in the future. Careful unit tests can generally avoid those problems, however.
I ran each of these examples 10 million times, and the results value is the number of ElapsedTicks that have passed.
Without further ado, from slowest to quickest, the algorithms are:
Converting to a string, take first character
int firstDigit = (int)(Value.ToString()[0]) - 48;
Results:
12,552,893 ticks
Using a logarithm
int firstDigit = (int)(Value / Math.Pow(10, (int)Math.Floor(Math.Log10(Value))));
Results:
9,165,089 ticks
Looping
while (number >= 10)
number /= 10;
Results:
6,001,570 ticks
Conditionals
int firstdigit;
if (Value < 10)
firstdigit = Value;
else if (Value < 100)
firstdigit = Value / 10;
else if (Value < 1000)
firstdigit = Value / 100;
else if (Value < 10000)
firstdigit = Value / 1000;
else if (Value < 100000)
firstdigit = Value / 10000;
else if (Value < 1000000)
firstdigit = Value / 100000;
else if (Value < 10000000)
firstdigit = Value / 1000000;
else if (Value < 100000000)
firstdigit = Value / 10000000;
else if (Value < 1000000000)
firstdigit = Value / 100000000;
else
firstdigit = Value / 1000000000;
Results:
1,421,659 ticks
Unrolled & optimized loop
if (i >= 100000000) i /= 100000000;
if (i >= 10000) i /= 10000;
if (i >= 100) i /= 100;
if (i >= 10) i /= 10;
Results:
1,399,788 ticks
Note:
each test calls Random.Next() to get the next int
Here's how
int i = Math.Abs(386792);
while(i >= 10)
i /= 10;
and i will contain what you need
Try this
public int GetFirstDigit(int number) {
if ( number < 10 ) {
return number;
}
return GetFirstDigit ( (number - (number % 10)) / 10);
}
EDIT
Several people have requested the loop version
public static int GetFirstDigitLoop(int number)
{
while (number >= 10)
{
number = (number - (number % 10)) / 10;
}
return number;
}
The best I can come up with is:
int numberOfDigits = Convert.ToInt32(Math.Floor( Math.Log10( value ) ) );
int firstDigit = value / Math.Pow( 10, numberOfDigits );
variation on Anton's answer:
// cut down the number of divisions (assuming i is positive & 32 bits)
if (i >= 100000000) i /= 100000000;
if (i >= 10000) i /= 10000;
if (i >= 100) i /= 100;
if (i >= 10) i /= 10;
int myNumber = 8383;
char firstDigit = myNumber.ToString()[0];
// char = '8'
Had the same idea as Lennaert
int start = number == 0 ? 0 : number / (int) Math.Pow(10,Math.Floor(Math.Log10(Math.Abs(number))));
This also works with negative numbers.
If you think Keltex's answer is ugly, try this one, it's REALLY ugly, and even faster.
It does unrolled binary search to determine the length.
... leading code along the same lines
/* i<10000 */
if (i >= 100){
if (i >= 1000){
return i/1000;
}
else /* i<1000 */{
return i/100;
}
}
else /* i<100*/ {
if (i >= 10){
return i/10;
}
else /* i<10 */{
return i;
}
}
P.S. MartinStettner had the same idea.
Very simple (and probably quite fast because it only involves comparisons and one division):
if(i<10)
firstdigit = i;
else if (i<100)
firstdigit = i/10;
else if (i<1000)
firstdigit = i/100;
else if (i<10000)
firstdigit = i/1000;
else if (i<100000)
firstdigit = i/10000;
else (etc... all the way up to 1000000000)
An obvious, but slow, mathematical approach is:
int firstDigit = (int)(i / Math.Pow(10, (int)Math.Log10(i))));
int temp = i;
while (temp >= 10)
{
temp /= 10;
}
Result in temp
I know it's not C#, but it's surprising curious that in python the "get the first char of the string representation of the number" is the faster!
EDIT: no, I made a mistake, I forgot to construct again the int, sorry. The unrolled version it's the fastest.
$ cat first_digit.py
def loop(n):
while n >= 10:
n /= 10
return n
def unrolled(n):
while n >= 100000000: # yea... unlimited size int supported :)
n /= 100000000
if n >= 10000:
n /= 10000
if n >= 100:
n /= 100
if n >= 10:
n /= 10
return n
def string(n):
return int(str(n)[0])
$ python -mtimeit -s 'from first_digit import loop as test' \
'for n in xrange(0, 100000000, 1000): test(n)'
10 loops, best of 3: 275 msec per loop
$ python -mtimeit -s 'from first_digit import unrolled as test' \
'for n in xrange(0, 100000000, 1000): test(n)'
10 loops, best of 3: 149 msec per loop
$ python -mtimeit -s 'from first_digit import string as test' \
'for n in xrange(0, 100000000, 1000): test(n)'
10 loops, best of 3: 284 msec per loop
$
I just stumbled upon this old question and felt inclined to propose another suggestion since none of the other answers so far returns the correct result for all possible input values and it can still be made faster:
public static int GetFirstDigit( int i )
{
if( i < 0 && ( i = -i ) < 0 ) return 2;
return ( i < 100 ) ? ( i < 1 ) ? 0 : ( i < 10 )
? i : i / 10 : ( i < 1000000 ) ? ( i < 10000 )
? ( i < 1000 ) ? i / 100 : i / 1000 : ( i < 100000 )
? i / 10000 : i / 100000 : ( i < 100000000 )
? ( i < 10000000 ) ? i / 1000000 : i / 10000000
: ( i < 1000000000 ) ? i / 100000000 : i / 1000000000;
}
This works for all signed integer values inclusive -2147483648 which is the smallest signed integer and doesn't have a positive counterpart. Math.Abs( -2147483648 ) triggers a System.OverflowException and - -2147483648 computes to -2147483648.
The implementation can be seen as a combination of the advantages of the two fastest implementations so far. It uses a binary search and avoids superfluous divisions. A quick benchmark with the index of a loop with 100,000,000 iterations shows that it is twice as fast as the currently fastest implementation.
It finishes after 2,829,581 ticks.
For comparison I also measured a corrected variant of the currently fastest implementation which took 5,664,627 ticks.
public static int GetFirstDigitX( int i )
{
if( i < 0 && ( i = -i ) < 0 ) return 2;
if( i >= 100000000 ) i /= 100000000;
if( i >= 10000 ) i /= 10000;
if( i >= 100 ) i /= 100;
if( i >= 10 ) i /= 10;
return i;
}
The accepted answer with the same correction needed 16,561,929 ticks for this test on my computer.
public static int GetFirstDigitY( int i )
{
if( i < 0 && ( i = -i ) < 0 ) return 2;
while( i >= 10 )
i /= 10;
return i;
}
Simple functions like these can easily be proven for correctness since iterating all possible integer values takes not much more than a few seconds on current hardware. This means that it is less important to implement them in a exceptionally readable fashion as there simply won't ever be the need to fix a bug inside them later on.
Did some tests with one of my co-workers here, and found out most of the solutions don't work for numbers under 0.
public int GetFirstDigit(int number)
{
number = Math.Abs(number); <- makes sure you really get the digit!
if (number < 10)
{
return number;
}
return GetFirstDigit((number - (number % 10)) / 10);
}
Using all the examples below to get this code:
using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Text;
using System.Diagnostics;
namespace Benfords
{
class Program
{
static int FirstDigit1(int value)
{
return Convert.ToInt32(value.ToString().Substring(0, 1));
}
static int FirstDigit2(int value)
{
while (value >= 10) value /= 10;
return value;
}
static int FirstDigit3(int value)
{
return (int)(value.ToString()[0]) - 48;
}
static int FirstDigit4(int value)
{
return (int)(value / Math.Pow(10, (int)Math.Floor(Math.Log10(value))));
}
static int FirstDigit5(int value)
{
if (value < 10) return value;
if (value < 100) return value / 10;
if (value < 1000) return value / 100;
if (value < 10000) return value / 1000;
if (value < 100000) return value / 10000;
if (value < 1000000) return value / 100000;
if (value < 10000000) return value / 1000000;
if (value < 100000000) return value / 10000000;
if (value < 1000000000) return value / 100000000;
return value / 1000000000;
}
static int FirstDigit6(int value)
{
if (value >= 100000000) value /= 100000000;
if (value >= 10000) value /= 10000;
if (value >= 100) value /= 100;
if (value >= 10) value /= 10;
return value;
}
const int mcTests = 1000000;
static void Main(string[] args)
{
Stopwatch lswWatch = new Stopwatch();
Random lrRandom = new Random();
int liCounter;
lswWatch.Start();
for (liCounter = 0; liCounter < mcTests; liCounter++)
FirstDigit1(lrRandom.Next());
lswWatch.Stop();
Console.WriteLine("Test {0} = {1} ticks", 1, lswWatch.ElapsedTicks);
lswWatch.Reset();
lswWatch.Start();
for (liCounter = 0; liCounter < mcTests; liCounter++)
FirstDigit2(lrRandom.Next());
lswWatch.Stop();
Console.WriteLine("Test {0} = {1} ticks", 2, lswWatch.ElapsedTicks);
lswWatch.Reset();
lswWatch.Start();
for (liCounter = 0; liCounter < mcTests; liCounter++)
FirstDigit3(lrRandom.Next());
lswWatch.Stop();
Console.WriteLine("Test {0} = {1} ticks", 3, lswWatch.ElapsedTicks);
lswWatch.Reset();
lswWatch.Start();
for (liCounter = 0; liCounter < mcTests; liCounter++)
FirstDigit4(lrRandom.Next());
lswWatch.Stop();
Console.WriteLine("Test {0} = {1} ticks", 4, lswWatch.ElapsedTicks);
lswWatch.Reset();
lswWatch.Start();
for (liCounter = 0; liCounter < mcTests; liCounter++)
FirstDigit5(lrRandom.Next());
lswWatch.Stop();
Console.WriteLine("Test {0} = {1} ticks", 5, lswWatch.ElapsedTicks);
lswWatch.Reset();
lswWatch.Start();
for (liCounter = 0; liCounter < mcTests; liCounter++)
FirstDigit6(lrRandom.Next());
lswWatch.Stop();
Console.WriteLine("Test {0} = {1} ticks", 6, lswWatch.ElapsedTicks);
Console.ReadLine();
}
}
}
I get these results on an AMD Ahtlon 64 X2 Dual Core 4200+ (2.2 GHz):
Test 1 = 2352048 ticks
Test 2 = 614550 ticks
Test 3 = 1354784 ticks
Test 4 = 844519 ticks
Test 5 = 150021 ticks
Test 6 = 192303 ticks
But get these on a AMD FX 8350 Eight Core (4.00 GHz)
Test 1 = 3917354 ticks
Test 2 = 811727 ticks
Test 3 = 2187388 ticks
Test 4 = 1790292 ticks
Test 5 = 241150 ticks
Test 6 = 227738 ticks
So whether or not method 5 or 6 is faster depends on the CPU, I can only surmise this is because the branch prediction in the command processor of the CPU is smarter on the new processor, but I'm not really sure.
I dont have any Intel CPUs, maybe someone could test it for us?
Check this one too:
int get1digit(Int64 myVal)
{
string q12 = myVal.ToString()[0].ToString();
int i = int.Parse(q12);
return i;
}
Also good if you want multiple numbers:
int get3digit(Int64 myVal) //Int64 or whatever numerical data you have
{
char mg1 = myVal.ToString()[0];
char mg2 = myVal.ToString()[1];
char mg3 = myVal.ToString()[2];
char[] chars = { mg1, mg2, mg3 };
string q12= new string(chars);
int i = int.Parse(q12);
return i;
}
while (i > 10)
{
i = (Int32)Math.Floor((Decimal)i / 10);
}
// i is now the first int
Non iterative formula:
public static int GetHighestDigit(int num)
{
if (num <= 0)
return 0;
return (int)((double)num / Math.Pow(10f, Math.Floor(Math.Log10(num))));
}
Just to give you an alternative, you could repeatedly divide the integer by 10, and then rollback one value once you reach zero. Since string operations are generally slow, this may be faster than string manipulation, but is by no means elegant.
Something like this:
while(curr>=10)
curr /= 10;
start = getFirstDigit(start);
public int getFirstDigit(final int start){
int number = Math.abs(start);
while(number > 10){
number /= 10;
}
return number;
}
or
public int getFirstDigit(final int start){
return getFirstDigit(Math.abs(start), true);
}
private int getFirstDigit(final int start, final boolean recurse){
if(start < 10){
return start;
}
return getFirstDigit(start / 10, recurse);
}
int start = curr;
while (start >= 10)
start /= 10;
This is more efficient than a ToString() approach which internally must implement a similar loop and has to construct (and parse) a string object on the way ...
Very easy method to get the Last digit:
int myInt = 1821;
int lastDigit = myInt - ((myInt/10)*10); // 1821 - 1820 = 1
int i = 4567789;
int digit1 = int.Parse(i.ToString()[0].ToString());
This is what I usually do ,please refer my function below :
This function can extract first number occurance from any string you can modify and use this function according to your usage
public static int GetFirstNumber(this string strInsput)
{
int number = 0;
string strNumber = "";
bool bIsContNo = true;
bool bNoOccued = false;
try
{
var arry = strInsput.ToCharArray(0, strInsput.Length - 1);
foreach (char item in arry)
{
if (char.IsNumber(item))
{
strNumber = strNumber + item.ToString();
bIsContNo = true;
bNoOccued = true;
}
else
{
bIsContNo = false;
}
if (bNoOccued && !bIsContNo)
{
break;
}
}
number = Convert.ToInt32(strNumber);
}
catch (Exception ex)
{
return 0;
}
return number;
}
public static int GetFirstDigit(int n, bool removeSign = true)
{
if (removeSign)
return n <= -10 || n >= 10 ? Math.Abs(n) % 10 : Math.Abs(n);
else
return n <= -10 || n >= 10 ? n % 10 : n;
}
//Your code goes here
int[] test = new int[] { -1574, -221, 1246, -4, 8, 38546};
foreach(int n in test)
Console.WriteLine(string.Format("{0} : {1}", n, GetFirstDigit(n)));
Output:
-1574 : 4
-221 : 1
1246 : 6
-4 : 4
8 : 8
38546 : 6
Here is a simpler way that does not involve looping
int number = 1234
int firstDigit = Math.Floor(number/(Math.Pow(10, number.ToString().length - 1))
That would give us 1234/Math.Pow(10, 4 - 1) = 1234/1000 = 1