Robbie's Perl Programming Blog

For those not familiar with "The Weekly Challenge", it is a weekly programming puzzle with two parts, cycling every Sunday. You can find it here: The Weekly Challenge The Weekly Challenge for the week of 2024-10-06 through 2024-10-12 is #290. Because these tasks both involve doubling things, my theme for this week is the witches' song from William Shakespeare's play Macbeth, Act IV, scene 1: Double, double toil and trouble; Fire burn and caldron bubble. Fillet of a fenny snake, In the caldron boil and bake; Eye of newt and toe of frog, Wool of bat and tongue of dog, Adder's fork and blind-worm's sting, Lizard's leg and howlet's wing, For a charm of powerful trouble, Like a hell-broth boil and bubble. The tasks for challenge #290 are as follows: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Task 290-1: "Double Exists" Submitted by: Mohammad Sajid Anwar You are given an array of integers, @ints. Write a script

For those not familiar with "The Weekly Challenge", it is a weekly programming puzzle with two parts, cycling every Sunday. You can find it here: The Weekly Challenge The Weekly Challenge for the week of 2024-09-29 through 2024-10-05 is #289. Its tasks are as follows: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Task 289-1: "Third Maximum" Submitted by: Mohammad Sajid Anwar You are given an array of integers, @ints. Write a script to find the third distinct maximum in the given array. If third maximum doesn’t exist then return the maximum number. Example 1: Input: @ints = (5, 6, 4, 1) Output: 4 The first distinct maximum is 6. The second distinct maximum is 5. The third distinct maximum is 4. Example 2: Input: @ints = (4, 5) Output: 5 In the given array, the third maximum doesn't exist, therefore return the maximum. Example 3: Input: @ints = (1, 2, 2, 3) Output: 1 The first distinct maximum is 3. The second distinct maximum is 2. T

For those not familiar with "The Weekly Challenge", it is a weekly programming puzzle with two parts, cycling every Sunday. You can find it here: The Weekly Challenge The Weekly Challenge for the week of 2024-09-22 through 2024-09-28 is #288. Its tasks are as follows: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Task 288-1: "Closest Palindrome" Submitted by: Mohammad Sajid Anwar You are given a string, $str, which is a non-negative integer. Write a script to find out the closest palindrome, not including itself. If there are more than one then return the smallest. The closest is defined as the absolute difference minimized between two integers. Example 1: Input: $str = "123" Output: "121" Example 2: Input: $str = "2" Output: "1" (There are two closest palindrome "1" and "3". Therefore we return the smallest "1".) Example 3: Input: $str = "1400" Out

For those not familiar with "The Weekly Challenge", it is a weekly programming puzzle with two parts, cycling every Sunday. You can find it here: The Weekly Challenge The Weekly Challenge for the week of 2024-09-15 through 2024-09-21 is #287. Its tasks are as follows: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Task 287-1: "Strong Password" Submitted by: Mohammad Sajid Anwar You are given a string, $str. Write a program to return the minimum number of steps required to make the given string a "strong password". If the string is already a "strong password", then return 0. The definition of "strong password" is as follows: - It must have at least 6 characters. - It must contain at least one lowercase letter - It must contain at least one uppercase letter - It must contain at least one digit - It mustn't contain 3 repeating characters in a row Each of the following is considered one "step": - Ins

For those not familiar with "The Weekly Challenge", it is a weekly programming puzzle with two parts, cycling every Sunday. You can find it here: The Weekly Challenge The Weekly Challenge for the week of 2024-09-08 through 2024-09-14 is #286. Its tasks are as follows: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Task 286-1: "Self Spammer" Submitted by: David Ferrone Write a program which outputs one word of its own script source code at random. A word is anything between whitespace, including symbols. Example 1: If the source code contains a line such as: 'open my $fh, "<", "ch-1.pl" or die;' then the program would output each of the words { open, my, $fh,, "<",, "ch-1.pl", or, die; } (along with other words in the source) with some positive probability. Example 2: Technically 'print(" hello ");' is *not* an example program, because it does not assign positive proba

For those not familiar with "The Weekly Challenge", it is a weekly programming puzzle with two parts, cycling every Sunday. You can find it here: The Weekly Challenge The Weekly Challenge for the week of 2024-09-01 through 2024-09-07 is #285. Its tasks are as follows: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Task 285-1: "No Connection" Submitted by: Mohammad Sajid Anwar You are given a list of routes, @routes. Write a script to find the destination with no further outgoing connection. Example 1: Input: @routes = (["B","C"], ["D","B"], ["C","A"]) Output: "A" "D" -> "B" -> "C" -> "A". "B" -> "C" -> "A". "C" -> "A". "A". Example 2: Input: @routes = (["A","Z"]) Output: "Z" This is just a matter of checking for end destina