Sunday, March 11, 2007

Project Euler: I am 10% genius

Project Euler is "a series of challenging mathematical/computer programming problems that will require more than just mathematical insights to solve. Although mathematics will help you arrive at elegant and efficient methods, the use of a computer and programming skills will be required to solve most problems."

I've solved 15 out of the (currently) 144 available problems, so I'm "10% genius". I've been using C++, with the help of my homebrew bignum class. It's a little ugly. I may redo my solutions in Python. Or maybe Ruby. Heck, maybe even Haskell.

Working through the puzzles seems like a good way to learn a new language. Additionally, I've been asked to solve variants of several of these problems on job interviews in the past, so this definitely keeps your mind sharp for that, too.

If you decide to participate, good luck, and have fun!

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posted by IvyMike @ 3/11/2007 11:58:00 PM 0 comments

Tuesday, November 21, 2006

Mike on Software: My favorite software activity

My favorite software activity is deleting code. Nothing makes me happier than removing complexity and cutting a function's length in half, all the while making it easier to understand.

Maybe that activity is more precisely stated as making code simpler--boiling things down to their bare essentials. It's Newton coming up with "F=ma", it's Einstein deriving "E=mc^2". It's the best feeling I can have as an engineer.

Someday, I hope to write a very concise but very clear regular expression that runs the universe.

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posted by IvyMike @ 11/21/2006 09:03:00 PM 2 comments