[newbie] Recursive algorithm - review

[Wiktor]

On Sat, 4 Jan 2014 22:18:09 +1100, Chris Angelico wrote:

>>> This is the same as you have at the top of 'if not towers'. Can you be
>>> confident that row is None any time towers is None? If so, just move
>>> this up above the other check and save the duplication.
>>
>>   row is None at start, but later it is list - sometimes an empty list. For
>> that cases this if statement was written. If row == [] -> generate new random
>> row that I can pop out from.
> 
> Yes, but will you ever pass a non-None row and a None towers? If not,
> you can deduplicate that bit of code by simply checking one before the
> other.

  Oh, now I understand what You mean.
  I rewrote that part.

def generate(size=4, towers=None, row=None, x=0):

    if not row:
        row = [a for a in range(1, size+1)]
        random.shuffle(row)

    if not towers:
        towers = [[0]*size for _ in range(size)]
        towers[0] = row[:]
        random.shuffle(row)
        x = size - 1 
        
    if x + 1 < size**2:
        # [...]

  Much more cleaner.
  Thanks!

-- 
Best regards,     Wiktor Matuszewski
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