HP Forums

As (I believe) many users here (and elsewhere) do; when I see a thread that asks for possible solutions for a problem I am not that motivated to contribute if I see a solution already posted that I judge better than mine.

Over time I instead realized that posting solutions that are different from the ones already posted, although "worse" for a given metric (larger, slower, whatever), is quite healthy for the discussion and the collaborative search of a better solution.

More often than not I see people picking this or that idea from other solutions, compose them in a different way to get a new approaches or even a better approach than the ones so far posted.

Therefore if you have a solution that is not matching any other already posted, please don't do like me, post it! (same request if you discuss on other platforms)
I, for one, appreciate it .

On the same note, don't be shy about posting things in the software library forums just because you don't think your implementations are very good/clever. If you've got a solution/program for a problem that hasn't been addressed, post it! Half the time I post my programs, it's because I know I'll prompt someone else to show me a much better way to do it, or point out some bug or edge case I missed.

Totally agreed !

On the recent July 2018 little math problem, I thought I had the fastest code.
When I re-implemented Cyrille de Brebisson Hp Prime code to Python, my brain just "clicked".

*** The trick to permutations problem is early branch cutting ***

With this insight, for a 10-sided zigzag, solving speed more than doubled :-)