For-Loop for finding combinations of springs? - function

I need to use a for-loop in a function in order to find spring constants of all possible combinations of springs in series and parallel. I have 5 springs with data therefore I found the spring constant (K) of each in a new matrix by using polyfit to find the slope (using F=Kx).
I have created a function that does so, however it returns data not in a matrix, but as individual outputs. So instead of KP (Parallel)= [1 2 3 4 5] it says KP=1, KP=2, KP=3, etc. Because of this, only the final output is stored in my workspace. Here is the code I have for the function. Keep in mind that the reason I need to use the +2 in the for loop for b is because my original matrix K with all spring constants is ten columns, with every odd number being a 0. Ex: K=[1 0 2 0 3 0 4 0 5] --- This is because my original dataset to find K (slope) was ten columns wide.
function[KP,KS]=function_name1(K)
L=length(K);
c=1;
for a=1:2:L
for b=a+2:2:L
KP=K(a)+K(b)
KS=1/((1/K(a))+(1/K(b)))
end
end
c=c+1;
and then a program calling that function
[KP,KS]=function_name1(K);
What I tried: - Suppressing and unsuppressing lines of code (unsuccessful)
Any help would be greatly appreciated.

hmmm...
your code seems workable, but you aren't dealing with things in the most practical manner
I'd start be redimensioning K so that it makes sense, that is that it's 5 spaces wide instead of your current 10 - you'll see why in a minute.
Then I'd adjust KP and KS to the size that you want (I'm going to do a 5X5 as that will give all the permutations - right now it looks like you are doing some triangular thing, I wouldn't worry too much about space unless you were to do this for say 50,000 spring constants or so)
So my code would look like this
function[KP,KS]=function_name1(K)
L=length(K);
KP = zeros(L);
KS = zeros(l);
c=1;
for a=1:L
for b=1:L
KP(a,b)=K(a)+K(b)
KS(a,b)=1/((1/K(a))+(1/K(b)))
end
end
c=c+1;
then when you want the parallel combination of springs 1 and 4 KP(1,4) or KP(4,1) will do the trick

Related

F#: How to Call a function with Argument Byref Int

I have this code:
let sumfunc(n: int byref) =
let mutable s = 0
while n >= 1 do
s <- n + (n-1)
n <- n-1
printfn "%i" s
sumfunc 6
I get the error:
(8,10): error FS0001: This expression was expected to have type
'byref<int>'
but here has type
'int'
So from that I can tell what the problem is but I just dont know how to solve it. I guess I need to specify the number 6 to be a byref<int> somehow. I just dont know how. My main goal here is to make n or the function argument mutable so I can change and use its value inside the function.
Good for you for being upfront about this being a school assignment, and for doing the work yourself instead of just asking a question that boils down to "Please do my homework for me". Because you were honest about it, I'm going to give you a more detailed answer than I would have otherwise.
First, that seems to be a very strange assignment. Using a while loop and just a single local variable is leading you down the path of re-using the n parameter, which is a very bad idea. As a general rule, a function should never modify values outside of itself — and that's what you're trying to do by using a byref parameter. Once you're experienced enough to know why byref is a bad idea most of the time, you're experienced enough to know why it might — MIGHT — be necessary some of the time. But let me show you why it's a bad idea, by using the code that s952163 wrote:
let sumfunc2 (n: int byref) =
let mutable s = 0
while n >= 1 do
s <- n + (n - 1)
n <- n-1
printfn "%i" s
let t = ref 6
printfn "The value of t is %d" t.contents
sumfunc t
printfn "The value of t is %d" t.contents
This outputs:
The value of t is 7
13
11
9
7
5
3
1
The value of t is 0
Were you expecting that? Were you expecting the value of t to change just because you passed it to a function? You shouldn't. You really, REALLY shouldn't. Functions should, as far as possible, be "pure" -- a "pure" function, in programming terminology, is one that doesn't modify anything outside itself -- and therefore, if you run it twice with the same input, it should produce the same output every time.
I'll give you a way to solve this soon, but I'm going to post what I've written so far right now so that you see it.
UPDATE: Now, here's a better way to solve it. First, has your teacher covered recursion yet? If he hasn't, then here's a brief summary: functions can call themselves, and that's a very useful technique for solving all sorts of problems. If you're writing a recursive function, you need to add the rec keyword immediately after let, like so:
let rec sumExampleFromStackOverflow n =
if n <= 0 then
0
else
n + sumExampleFromStackOverflow (n-1)
let t = 7
printfn "The value of t is %d" t
printfn "The sum of 1 through t is %d" (sumExampleFromStackOverflow t)
printfn "The value of t is %d" t
Note how I didn't need to make t mutable this time. In fact, I could have just called sumExampleFromStackOverflow 7 and it would have worked.
Now, this doesn't use a while loop, so it might not be what your teacher is looking for. And I see that s952163 has just updated his answer with a different solution. But you should really get used to the idea of recursion as soon as you can, because breaking the problem down into individual steps using recursion is a really powerful technique for solving a lot of problems in F#. So even though this isn't the answer you're looking for right now, it is the answer you're going to be looking for soon.
P.S. If you use any of the help you've gotten here, tell your teacher that you've done so, and give him the URL of this question (http://stackoverflow.com/questions/39698430/f-how-to-call-a-function-with-argument-byref-int) so he can read what you asked and what other people told you. If he's a good teacher, he won't lower your grade for doing that; in fact, he might raise it for being honest and upfront about how you solved the problem. But if you got help with your homework and you don't tell your teacher, 1) that's dishonest, and 2) you'll only hurt yourself in the long run, because he'll think you understand a concept that you maybe haven't understood yet.
UPDATE 2: s952163 suggests that I show you how to use the fold and scan functions, and I thought "Why not?" Keep in mind that these are advanced techniques, so you probably won't get assignments where you need to use fold for a while. But fold is basically a way to take any list and do a calculation that turns the list into a single value, in a generic way. With fold, you specify three things: the list you want to work with, the starting value for your calculation, and a function of two parameters that will do one step of the calculation. For example, if you're trying to add up all the numbers from 1 to n, your "one step" function would be let add a b = a + b. (There's an even more advanced feature of F# that I'm skipping in this explanation, because you should learn just one thing at a time. By skipping it, it keeps the add function simple and easy to understand.)
The way you would use fold looks like this:
let sumWithFold n =
let upToN = [1..n] // This is the list [1; 2; 3; ...; n]
let add a b = a + b
List.fold add 0 upToN
Note that I wrote List.fold. If upToN was an array, then I would have written Array.fold instead. The arguments to fold, whether it's List.fold or Array.fold, are, in order:
The function to do one step of your calculation
The initial value for your calculation
The list (if using List.fold) or array (if using Array.fold) that you want to do the calculation with.
Let me step you through what List.fold does. We'll pretend you've called your function with 4 as the value of n.
First step: the list is [1;2;3;4], and an internal valueSoFar variable inside List.fold is set to the initial value, which in our case is 0.
Next: the calculation function (in our case, add) is called with valueSoFar as the first parameter, and the first item of the list as the second parameter. So we call add 0 1 and get the result 1. The internal valueSoFar variable is updated to 1, and the rest of the list is [2;3;4]. Since that is not yet empty, List.fold will continue to run.
Next: the calculation function (add) is called with valueSoFar as the first parameter, and the first item of the remainder of the list as the second parameter. So we call add 1 2 and get the result 3. The internal valueSoFar variable is updated to 3, and the rest of the list is [3;4]. Since that is not yet empty, List.fold will continue to run.
Next: the calculation function (add) is called with valueSoFar as the first parameter, and the first item of the remainder of the list as the second parameter. So we call add 3 3 and get the result 6. The internal valueSoFar variable is updated to 6, and the rest of the list is [4] (that's a list with one item, the number 4). Since that is not yet empty, List.fold will continue to run.
Next: the calculation function (add) is called with valueSoFar as the first parameter, and the first item of the remainder of the list as the second parameter. So we call add 6 4 and get the result 10. The internal valueSoFar variable is updated to 10, and the rest of the list is [] (that's an empty list). Since the remainder of the list is now empty, List.fold will stop, and return the current value of valueSoFar as its final result.
So calling List.fold add 0 [1;2;3;4] will essentially return 0+1+2+3+4, or 10.
Now we'll talk about scan. The scan function is just like the fold function, except that instead of returning just the final value, it returns a list of the values produced at all the steps (including the initial value). (Or if you called Array.scan, it returns an array of the values produced at all the steps). In other words, if you call List.scan add 0 [1;2;3;4], it goes through the same steps as List.fold add 0 [1;2;3;4], but it builds up a result list as it does each step of the calculation, and returns [0;1;3;6;10]. (The initial value is the first item of the list, then each step of the calculation).
As I said, these are advanced functions, that your teacher won't be covering just yet. But I figured I'd whet your appetite for what F# can do. By using List.fold, you don't have to write a while loop, or a for loop, or even use recursion: all that is done for you! All you have to do is write a function that does one step of a calculation, and F# will do all the rest.
This is such a bad idea:
let mutable n = 7
let sumfunc2 (n: int byref) =
let mutable s = 0
while n >= 1 do
s <- n + (n - 1)
n <- n-1
printfn "%i" s
sumfunc2 (&n)
Totally agree with munn's comments, here's another way to implode:
let sumfunc3 (n: int) =
let mutable s = n
while s >= 1 do
let n = s + (s - 1)
s <- (s-1)
printfn "%i" n
sumfunc3 7

Plot power series gnuplot

I'd like to know how to plot power series (whose variable is x), but I don't even know where to start with.
I know it might not be possible plot infinite series, but it'd do as well plotting the sum of the first n terms.
Gnuplot has a sum function, which can be used inside the using statement to sum up several columns or terms. Together with the special file name + you can implement power series.
Consider the exponention function, which has a power series
\sum_{n=0}^\infty x^n/n!
So, we define a term as
term(x, n) = x**n/n!
Now we can plot the power series up to the n=5 term with
set xrange [0:4]
term(x, n) = x**n/n!
set samples 20
plot '+' using 1:(sum [n=0:5] term($1, n))
To plot the results when using 2 to 7 terms and compare it with the actual exp function, use
term(x, n) = x**n/n!
set xrange [-2:2]
set samples 41
set key left
plot exp(x), for [i=1:6] '+' using 1:(sum[t=0:i] term($1, t)) title sprintf('%d terms', i)
The easiest way that I can think of is to generate a file that has a column of x-values and a column of f(x) values, then just plot the table like you would any other data. A power series is continuous, so you can just connect the dots and have a fairly accurate representation (provided your dots are close enough together). Also, when evaluating f(x), you just sum up the first N terms (where N is big enough). Big enough means that the sum of the rest of the terms is smaller than whatever error you allow. (*If you want 3 good digits, then N needs to be large enough that the remaining sum is smaller than .001.)
You can pull out a calc II textbook to determine how to bound the error on the tail of the sum. A lot of calc classes briefly cover it, but students tend to feel like the error estimates are pointless (I know because I've taught the course a few times.) As an example, if you have an alternating series (whose terms are decreasing in absolute value), then the absolute value of the first term you omit (don't sum) is an upperbound on your error.
*This statement is not 100% true, it is slightly over simplified, but is correct for most practical purposes.

Cuda Kernel with different array sizes

I am working on a fluid dynamic problem in cuda and discovered a problem like this
if I have an array e.g debug_array with the length 600 and an array
value_array with the length 100 and I wanna do sth like
for(int i=0;i<6;i++)
{
debug_array[6*(bx*block_size+tx)+i] = value_array[bx*block_size+tx];
}
block_size would in this example be based on the 100 element array, e.g
4 blocks block_size 25
if value_array contains e.g 10;20;30;.....
I would expect debug_array to have groups of 6 similar values like
10;10;10;10;10;10;20;20;20;20;20;20;30......
The problem is that it is not picking up all values from the values array, any idea
why this isn't working or a good workaround.
What will work is if I define float val = value_array[bx*block_size+tx]; outside the for loop and keep this inside the loop debug_array[bx*block_size+tx+i] = val;
But I would like to avoid that as my kernels have between 5 and 10 device function inside the loop and it makes it just hard to read.
thanks in advance any advice will be appriciated
Markus
There seems to be an error in computing the index:
Let's assume bx = 0 and tx = 0
The first 6 elements in debug_array will be filled with data.
Next thread: tx = 1: Elements 1 to 7 will be filled with data (overwriting existing data).
Due to the threads working in parallel it is not determined which thread will be scheduled first and therefore which values will be written into the debug_array.
You should have written:
debug_array[6*(bx*block_size+tx)+i] = value_array[bx*block_size+tx];
If changing the code to move the value_array expression out of the loop and into a temp variable makes the code work - and that is the only code change you made - then this smells like a compiler bug.
Try changing your nvcc compiler options to reduce or disable optimizations and see if the value_array expression inside the loop changes behavior. Also, make sure you're using the latest CUDA tools.
Optimizing compilers will often attempt to move expressions that aren't dependent on the loop index variable out of the loop, exactly like your manual workaround. It's called "invariant code motion" and it makes loops faster by reducing the amount of code that executes in each iteration of the loop. If manually extracting the invariant code from the loop works, but letting the compiler figure it out on its own doesn't, that casts doubt on the compiler.

Matlab: how to apply point-wise function on a matrix?

I am using Matlab to do one of my projects. I am stuck at one basic thing.
I have 2 matricies - A and B and a vector V. What I want to do is this:
A(i, j) = V(B(i,j)) for all i, j.
I tried doing this in the most obvious way - nested loops. For some reason, A is not getting populated. Am I missing something? Is there a more efficient (in-built function) way of doing this.
Thanks,
Anil.
If all entries in B are integers larger than zero, and if the maximum of B is not larger than the number of elements in V, then you can simply write
A = V(B);

How do I detect circular logic or recursion in a multi-levels references and dependencies

I have a graph of multi-level dependecies like this, and I need to detect any circular reference in this graph.
A = B
B = C
C = [D, B]
D = [C, A]
Somebody have a problem like this?
Any solution???
Thanks and sorry by english.
========= updated ==========
I had another situation.
1
2 = 1
3 = 2
4 = [2, 3]
5 = 4
In this case, my recursive code iterate two times in "4" reference, but this references don't generate a infinite loop. My problem is to know when function iterate more than one time a reference and is not infinite loop and when is a infinite loop, to inform user.
1 = 4
2 = 1
3 = 2
4 = [2, 3]
5 = 4
This case is a bit diferent from 2th example. This generate a infinite loop. how can I know when cases generate a infinite loop or not?
Topological sorting. The description on Wikipedia is clear and works for all your examples.
Basically you start with a node that has no dependencies, put it in a list of sorted nodes, and then remove that dependency from every node. For you second example that means you start with 1. Once you remove all dependencies on 1 you're left with 2. You end up sorting them 1,2,3,4,5 and seeing that there's no cycle.
For your third example, every node has a dependency, so there's nowhere to start. Such a graph must contain at least one cycle.
Keep a list of uniquely identified nodes. Try to loop through the entire tree but keep checking nodes in the list till you get a node being referred as a child which is already there in the unique list - take it from there (handle the loop or simply ignore it depending on your requirement)
One way to detect circular dependency is to keep a record of the length of the dependency chains that your ordering algorithm detects. If a chain becomes longer than the total number of nodes (due to repetition over a loop) then there is a circular dependency. This should work both for an iterative and for a recursive algorithm.