im trying to learn programming, and the tutorial that i am using has been pretty good, but has exercises at the end of each lesson. For the most part, im doing pretty decent with the exercises, but could use a little help on some of them.....if anyone is fluent....
is anyone a programmer (python)?
- Thread starter oppie2005
- Start date
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ok. i dont know if you can help or not, cause im inexperienced, and dont know how similar the "problem" is with other languages.
the exercise says to define a function to give the sum of of all integer numbers up to and including n using the accumulator pattern. the example earlier in the tutorial for the accumulator pattern was for calculating the square root of n.
an earlier exercise was to define the same "sumTo" function, using a different way to calculate it
def sumTo
:
y = (n * (n+1))/2
return y
Im understanding the accumulator pattern to mean updating a variable for each cycle through a for loop that would add up each number in the range of n, instead of in the example above where multiplication and division is used.
does my ramblings make any sense? i think i have confused myself even further in this process lol.
[edit:]the tutorial that i am using is found here: http://interactivepython.org/courselib/static/thinkcspy/Functions/functions.html
where it talks about the accumulator pattern, is about halfway down the page, and the exercise that im working on is near the very bottom of the page.
the exercise says to define a function to give the sum of of all integer numbers up to and including n using the accumulator pattern. the example earlier in the tutorial for the accumulator pattern was for calculating the square root of n.
an earlier exercise was to define the same "sumTo" function, using a different way to calculate it
def sumTo
:y = (n * (n+1))/2
return y
Im understanding the accumulator pattern to mean updating a variable for each cycle through a for loop that would add up each number in the range of n, instead of in the example above where multiplication and division is used.
does my ramblings make any sense? i think i have confused myself even further in this process lol.
[edit:]the tutorial that i am using is found here: http://interactivepython.org/courselib/static/thinkcspy/Functions/functions.html
where it talks about the accumulator pattern, is about halfway down the page, and the exercise that im working on is near the very bottom of the page.
Last edited:
In SAS, this would look something like this:
%let maxnum=13;
%macro data_mining;
%do i=1 %to &maxnum;
def sumTo(i):
y = (i * (i+1))/2
%end;
%mend;
%data_mining;
Sorry, I have used a lot of languages, but not Python.
%let maxnum=13;
%macro data_mining;
%do i=1 %to &maxnum;
def sumTo(i):
y = (i * (i+1))/2
%end;
%mend;
%data_mining;
Sorry, I have used a lot of languages, but not Python.
Not sure I fully understood what is meant be "accumulator pattern", but you have two basic choices for calculating the sum of integers in a range from 0..n - an iterative loop (for/next, while/wend, etc.) or a recursive function (likely not the approach they are looking for in an introductory programming course). It would look something like this:
def AddOneToN
lSum = 0
FOR lLoopCounter = 1 TO n
lSum = lSum + lLoopCounter
NEXT
return lSum
It is a language that is good at using large amounts of data and statistical analysis.
pmbug, you, sir, are a genius.
from your example i typed
def sumTo:
----runningtotal = 0
----for counter in range(n +1):
--------runningtotal = runningtotal + counter
----return runningtotal
and that was exactly what i was trying to do. i spent an hour or two trying to figure it out last night.
btw, PMBug, what language are you using for that example?
from your example i typed
def sumTo
:----runningtotal = 0
----for counter in range(n +1):
--------runningtotal = runningtotal + counter
----return runningtotal
and that was exactly what i was trying to do. i spent an hour or two trying to figure it out last night.
btw, PMBug, what language are you using for that example?
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