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Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time

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On Fri, May 6, 2011 at 10:59 AM, Steven D'Aprano
<steve+comp.lang.python@pearwood.info> wrote:
> As written, amb is just a brute-force solver using more magic than is
> good for any code, but it's fun to play with.

This isn't really amb; as you said it's just a brute-force solver with
some weird syntax.  The whole point of amb is to enable
non-deterministic programming, such as this:

def find_values():
    a = amb(1, 3, 5)
    b = amb(2, 4, 8)
    if a + b <= 5:
        fail()
    if not is_prime(a * b + 1):
        fail()
    c = amb(a, b, None)
    if c is not None and c < 5:
        fail()
    return a, b, c

The amb engine would conceptually execute this function for every
possible combination of a, b, and c, pruning away the combinations
that fail at some point, and arbitrarily returning one of the
remaining combinations.  So find_values() here might return (3, 4,
None) after failing at one point or another on (1, 2); (1, 4); (1, 8);
(3, 2); (3, 4, 3); and (3; 4; 4).

Note in particular that the declaration of c is not easily expressible
using the Python recipe.

This is typically implemented using continuations, and I'm not sure
whether a true amb could actually be achieved in Python without adding
continuations or flow-control macros to the language.

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Thread

Coolest Python recipe of all time Raymond Hettinger <python@rcn.com> - 2011-05-02 10:33 -0700
  Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time David Monaghan <monaghand.david@gmail.com> - 2011-05-02 21:48 +0100
    Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> - 2011-05-02 14:58 -0600
      Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time David Monaghan <monaghand.david@gmail.com> - 2011-05-02 22:45 +0100
        Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time Stefan Behnel <stefan_ml@behnel.de> - 2011-05-03 07:04 +0200
          Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time Raymond Hettinger <python@rcn.com> - 2011-05-03 09:43 -0700
            Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com> - 2011-05-04 07:54 +1000
            Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> - 2011-05-03 16:10 -0600
        Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> - 2011-05-02 23:17 -0600
        Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time Terry Reedy <tjreedy@udel.edu> - 2011-05-03 02:00 -0400
          Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time Gregory Ewing <greg.ewing@canterbury.ac.nz> - 2011-05-03 18:29 +1200
            Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time Terry Reedy <tjreedy@udel.edu> - 2011-05-03 11:49 -0400
            Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time Raymond Hettinger <python@rcn.com> - 2011-05-03 09:32 -0700
            Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time geremy condra <debatem1@gmail.com> - 2011-05-03 09:51 -0700
        Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time Stefan Behnel <stefan_ml@behnel.de> - 2011-05-03 08:23 +0200
          Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time Raymond Hettinger <python@rcn.com> - 2011-05-03 15:19 -0700
  Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time Steven D'Aprano <steve+comp.lang.python@pearwood.info> - 2011-05-06 16:59 +0000
    Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time geremy condra <debatem1@gmail.com> - 2011-05-06 10:43 -0700
    Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> - 2011-05-06 12:36 -0600
      Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time Steven D'Aprano <steve+comp.lang.python@pearwood.info> - 2011-05-07 08:29 +0000
        Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> - 2011-05-07 08:54 -0600
        Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time Raymond Hettinger <python@rcn.com> - 2011-05-07 14:02 -0700
    Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time Ian Kelly <ian.g.kelly@gmail.com> - 2011-05-06 13:38 -0600
    Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time Raymond Hettinger <python@rcn.com> - 2011-05-06 12:58 -0700
  RE: Coolest Python recipe of all time Trent Nelson <trent@snakebite.org> - 2011-05-09 02:31 -0700
    Re: Coolest Python recipe of all time Raymond Hettinger <python@rcn.com> - 2011-05-09 14:10 -0700

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