Code Golf: Print the entire “12 Days of Christmas” song in the fewest lines of code

Answer 1

Ruby

a=["and a partridge in a pear tree","turtle doves","French hens","calling birds","golden rings","geese a-laying","swans a-swimming","maids a-milking","ladies dancing","lords a-leaping","pipers piping","drummers drumming"]     
b=["","two","three","four","five","six","seven","eight","nine","ten","eleven","twelve"]
c=["first","second","third","fourth","fifth","sixth","seventh","eighth","nineth","tenth","eleventh","twelfth"]
0.upto(11){|d|puts "On the "+c[d]+" day of Christmas, my true love gave to me:\n"+b[d]+" "+a[d]+",";(d-1).downto(0){|e| f=", ";f = "." if e==0;puts b[e]+" "+a[e]+f;}}

Total: 593bytes using UNIX LF.

Answer 2

Common Lisp:

(mapc #'princ
      (reverse (maplist #'(lambda(l)
         (format nil 
            "On the ~:R day of Christmas my true love gave to me~%~{~a~%~}~%" 
                (length l) l)) 
    '("twelve drummers drumming,"
      "eleven pipers piping,"
      "ten lords a-leaping,"
      "nine ladies dancing,"
      "eight maids a-milking,"
      "seven swans a-swimming,"
      "six geese a-laying,"
      "five gold rings,"
      "four calling birds,"
      "three french hens,"
      "two turtle doves, and"
      "a partridge in a pear tree."))))

Edit:

Above is 412 characters if you take out the whitespace.

This one:

(let ((g))
  (dotimes (i 12)
    (format t
        "On the ~:R day of Christmas my true love gave to me~%~{~R ~:*~
         ~[~;~;turtle doves and~;french hens,~;calling birds,~;gold rings,~
         ~;geese a-laying,~;swans a-swimming,~;maids a-milking,~
         ~;ladies dancing,~;lords a-leaping,~;pipers piping,~
         ~;drummers drumming,~]~%~}a partridge in a pear tree~2%"
        (1+ i) g)
    (push (+ i 2) g)))

is 344 characters if you take out whitespace and ~ quoted newlines in the format string:

(let((g))(dotimes(i 12)(format t"On the ~:R day of Christmas my true love gave to me~%~{~R ~:*~[~;~;turtle doves and~;french hens,~;calling birds,~;gold rings,~;geese a-laying,~;swans a-swimming,~;maids a-milking,~;ladies dancing,~;lords a-leaping,~;pipers piping,~;drummers drumming,~]~%~}a partridge in a pear tree~2%"(1+ i)g)(push(+ i 2)g)))

Edit:

It looks like the question has run its course, and the site is nagging me to accept an answer. As far as I can see, this one is the shortest. I'm a little afraid of what the site will do if I accept my own answer - probably award me a Narcissist or Masturbator badge.

You can't accept your own answers. Fair enough. I'll leave it open. Thanks to everyone who responded.

Answer 3

Using F#:

#light
open System.Net; open System.Text.RegularExpressions
printf "%s" ((new WebClient()).DownloadString("http://www.textfiles.com/holiday/12-bugs")
    |> (fun x -> (new Regex("Lines: \d+\s+([\s\S]+)--")).Match(x).Groups.[1].Value))

Twelth day outputs:

For the twelfth bug of Christmas, my manager said to me
     Tell them it's a feature
     Say it's not supported
     Change the documentation
     Blame it on the hardware
     Find a way around it
     Say they need an upgrade
     Reinstall the software
     Ask for a dump
     Run with the debugger
     Try to reproduce it
     Ask them how they did it and
     See if they can do it again.

Answer 4

C#

     string[] days = new string[] {"First", 
    "Second", "Third", "Fourth", "Fifth", "Sixth", 
    "Seventh", "Eighth", "Ninth", "Tenth", "Eleventh", "Twelfth"};

    string[] presents = new string[] {"a partridge in a pear tree.",
    "two turtle doves, and",
    "three french hens,", 
    "four calling birds,", 
    "five gold rings,", 
    "six geese a-laying,", 
    "seven swans a-swimming,", 
    "eigth maids a-milking,", 
    "nine ladies dancing,", 
    "ten lords a-leaping,", 
    "eleven pipers piping,", 
    "twelve drummers drumming,"};

     int cnt =0;
     foreach (string s in presents)
     {
           Console.WriteLine(string.Format("On the {0} day of Christmas my true love gave to me", days[cnt++]));
           foreach (string p in presents.Take(cnt).Reverse())
                Console.WriteLine(p);
           Console.WriteLine(System.Environment.NewLine);
     }

Answer 5

Using Template Toolkit

perl -MTemplate -e 'Template->new()->process("12dayxmas.tt")'

12dayxmas.tt

[%
  list = [
    { day => 'first',    item => 'A partridge in a pear tree.'},
    { day => 'second',   item => 'Two turtle doves, and '},
    { day => 'third',    item => 'Three french hens, '},
    { day => 'fourth',   item => 'Four calling birds, '},
    { day => 'fifth',    item => 'Five gold rings, '},
    { day => 'sixth',    item => 'Six geese a-laying, '},
    { day => 'seventh',  item => 'Seven swans a-swimming, '},
    { day => 'eighth',   item => 'Eight maids a-milking, '},
    { day => 'nineth',   item => 'Nine ladies dancing, '},
    { day => 'tenth',    item => 'Ten lords a-leaping, '},
    { day => 'eleventh', item => 'Eleven pipers piping, '},
    { day => 'twelfth',  item => 'Twelve drummers drumming, '}
  ];
-%]
[%
  FOREACH list;
  present = item _ present;
-%]
On the [% day %] day of Christmas my true love gave me [% present %]

[% END %]

Answer 6

PHP: 375 characters

$v=split(":",":a partridge in a pear tree.\n:two turtle doves, and:three french hens:four calling birds:five gold rings:six geese a-lay:seven swans a-swimm:eigth maids a-milk:nine ladies danc:ten lords a-leap:eleven pipers pip:twelve drummers drumm");while($i<12){?>On the <?=date(jS,$i*86400)," day of Christmas my true love gave to me",$s=", ".$v[++$i].($i>5?'ing':'').$s;}

Edit: updated runnable version (377) characters

<?$v=split(":",":a partridge in a pear tree.\n:two turtle doves, and:three french hens:four calling birds:five gold rings:six geese a-lay:seven swans a-swimm:eigth maids a-milk:nine ladies danc:ten lords a-leap:eleven pipers pip:twelve drummers drumm");while($i<12){?>On the <?=date(jS,$i*86400)," day of Christmas my true love gave to me",$s=", ".$v[++$i].($i>5?'ing':'').$s;}