recursion in prolog (on lists)
Solution 1
The free online book "Learn Prolog Now" has a section dedicated to explaining the steps that append performs:
http://cs.union.edu/~striegnk/learn-prolog-now/html/node47.html#subsec.l6.defining.append
Solution 2
append(A, B, R)
means that R
is the result of appending A
to B
.
The base case
append([], X, X).
says that if A = []
and B = X
then R = X = B
: an empty list A
appended to some other list B
is equal to B
.
The recursive case
append([X | Y], Z, [X | W]) :- append(Y, Z, W).
says that if A = [X | Y]
is a non-empty list to append to B = Z
, and if W
is Y
appended to Z
, then R = [X | W]
.
Another way of saying it is: to append a non-empty list A
to another list B
, first append the tail of A
to B
and then add the head of A
to the front of the list.
DJPlayer
Java, C#, VB, Andoid and corporate IOS programmer by day.. bounty hunter/ninja assassin/kung fu warrior by night (plus holidays and sometimes on boring Sundays)
Updated on June 04, 2022Comments
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DJPlayer almost 2 years
can someone please help me just w/ the basics on performing recursive prolog functions..
append([],X,X). % base append([X|Y],Z,[X|W]) :- append(Y,Z,W). %recursive % base case addup([], 0). % sum of the empty list of numbers is zero % recursive case: if the base-case rule does not match, this one must: addup([FirstNumber | RestOfList], Total) :- addup(RestOfList, TotalOfRest), % add up the numbers in RestOfList Total is FirstNumber + TotalOfRest.
Can someone explain either in English or in C/C++/Java whatever.. how the steps. I actually would prefer to see something like append or reverse.. I'm mostly just manipulating lists of variables instead of integers.. (I've tried to work through append like 10 times.. ugh).
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DJPlayer almost 13 yearsthis follows the best format IMO. I've seen numerous ones like this just not translated to english for recursion. is the recursive version always read from left to right.. aka ", = and" thus operation perform in order left to right.. ([x|y], z, [x|w]). but only if append(y,z,w) holds.
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DJPlayer almost 13 yearsthis is the best step by step answer I've seen.. and I've looked through several books. Makes far more sense now after looking at a trace