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1 Palindrome 1 (Posted on 2006-06-10) Difficulty: 2 of 5
Take a standard 8x8 chessboard, number the black squares 1 and the white squares 0. How many palindromes does this board contain in 'word-search' fashion?

Now generalize and find a formula for any n*n board.

Notes: A palindrome and its reversal should not be counted twice. A palindrome must be at least two digits long and leading zeroes are not allowed. Numbers can be read in any single vertical, horizontal or diagonal direction.

See The Solution Submitted by Jer    
Rating: 3.6667 (3 votes)

Comments: ( Back to comment list | You must be logged in to post comments.)
re: partial solution | Comment 7 of 9 |
(In reply to partial solution by Justin)

The formula given for number of diagonal palindromes:

1/12(4(N^3)-6(N^2)+2N+6((-1)^N-1)(N-1)

works for even N, but not for odd, as shown by the following table:

 N         # of palind  diag palind    above formula   
 2             1             1             1
 3             6             4             3
 4             22            14            14
 5             46            28            26
 6             91            55            55
 7             148           88            85
 8             236           140           140
 9             340           200           196
 10            485           285           285

This assumes that for odd N, the corners are white.

DECLARE FUNCTION bd! (row!, col!)
DIM SHARED ct
CLS
n = 8
FOR n = 2 TO 10
  ct = 0
  dCt = 0
  FOR row = 1 TO n
  FOR col = 1 TO n

  IF bd(row, col) THEN
    FOR c = col + 1 TO n
      IF bd(row, c) THEN
        ct = ct + 1
      END IF
    NEXT c
    FOR r = row + 1 TO n
     FOR c = 1 TO n
      IF c = col OR ABS(row - r) = ABS(col - c) THEN
        IF bd(r, c) THEN
          ct = ct + 1
          IF c <> col THEN
            dCt = dCt + 1
          END IF
        END IF
      END IF
     NEXT c
    NEXT r
  END IF

  NEXT col
  NEXT row
  PRINT n, ct, dCt, 1 / 12 * (4 * (n ^ 3) - 6 * (n ^ 2) + 2 * n + 6 * ((-1) ^ n - 1) * (n - 1))
NEXT

FUNCTION bd (row, col)
 bd = (row + col) MOD 2
END FUNCTION

(it assumes the top-left is white, but that does not matter when N is even)

If we assume the corners for odd N are black, the figures are even more discrepant for odd N:

 2             1             1             1
 3             10            6             3
 4             22            14            14
 5             54            32            26
 6             91            55            55
 7             160           94            85
 8             236           140           140
 9             356           208           196
 10            485           285           285

(the above by changing to:

FUNCTION bd (row, col)
 bd = (row + col + 1) MOD 2
END FUNCTION

)

The algorithm merely checks the first and last digits for a 1.


  Posted by Charlie on 2006-06-11 09:52:16
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