eight queens problem in Python

Question

8-queens problem in Python.

Hi! I only start teaching Python, so could someone explain the code written below (found in the Internet)? Some pieces of the code are compli

Answer 1

Your code is wrong (cut and paste error?), but here's the gist:

You want a list of possible solutions. Each solution is a list of queens. Every queen is a tuple - a row (integer) and column (integer). For example, the solution for BOARD_SIZE=1 is [[(1,1)]] - a single solution - [(1,1)] containing a single queen - (1,1) placed on row 1 and column 1.

There are 8 smaller_solutions for BOARD_SIZE=8, and n=1 - [[(1,1)],[(1,2)],[(1,3)],[(1,4)],[(1,5)],[(1,6)],[(1,7)],[(1,8)]] - a single queen placed in every column in the first row.

You understand recursion? If not, google it NOW.

Basically, you start by adding 0 queens to a size 0 board - this has one trivial solution - no queens. Then you find the solutions that place one queen the first row of the board. Then you look for solutions which add a second queen to the 2nd row - somewhere that it's not under attack. And so on.

def solve(n):
    if n == 0: return [[]] # No RECURSION if n=0. 
    smaller_solutions = solve(n-1) # RECURSION!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
    solutions = []
    for solution in smaller_solutions:# I moved this around, so it makes more sense
        for column in range(1,BOARD_SIZE+1): # I changed this, so it makes more sense
            # try adding a new queen to row = n, column = column 
            if not under_attack(column , solution): 
                solutions.append(solution + [(n,column)])
    return solutions

That explains the general strategy, but not under_attack.

under_attack could be re-written, to make it easier to understand (for me, you, and your students):

def under_attack(column, existing_queens):
    # ASSUMES that row = len(existing_queens) + 1
    row = len(existing_queens)+1
    for queen in existing_queens:
        r,c = queen
        if r == row: return True # Check row
        if c == column: return True # Check column
        if (column-c) == (row-r): return True # Check left diagonal
        if (column-c) == -(row-r): return True # Check right diagonal
    return False

My method is a little slower, but not much.

The old under_attack is basically the same, but it speeds thing up a bit. It looks through existing_queens in reverse order (because it knows that the row position of the existing queens will keep counting down), keeping track of the left and right diagonal.