我认为你可能会花大部分时间去匹配那些不可能由你的字母网格构成的单词。所以，我要做的第一件事就是加快这一步，这应该能让你大致达到目的。
为此，我将把网格重新表示为一个可能的“移动”表，您可以根据您正在查看的字母转换对其进行索引。
首先从你的字母表中给每个字母分配一个数字(a =0, B=1, C=2，…等等)。
让我们举个例子:
h b c d
e e g h
l l k l
m o f p
现在，让我们使用现有字母的字母表(通常你可能每次都想使用相同的字母表):
b | c | d | e | f | g | h | k | l | m | o | p
---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+----+----
0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11
然后你创建一个2D布尔数组，告诉你是否有某个字母转换可用:
| 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 <- from letter
| b c d e f g h k l m o p
-----+--------------------------------------
0 b | T T T T
1 c | T T T T T
2 d | T T T
3 e | T T T T T T T
4 f | T T T T
5 g | T T T T T T T
6 h | T T T T T T T
7 k | T T T T T T T
8 l | T T T T T T T T T
9 m | T T
10 o | T T T T
11 p | T T T
^
to letter
现在浏览单词列表，将单词转换为过渡段:
hello (6, 3, 8, 8, 10):
6 -> 3, 3 -> 8, 8 -> 8, 8 -> 10
然后检查这些转换是否允许通过在你的表中查找它们:
[6][ 3] : T
[3][ 8] : T
[8][ 8] : T
[8][10] : T
如果它们都被允许，就有可能找到这个词。
例如，单词“头盔”可以在第4个转换(m到e:头盔)时被排除，因为表中的这个条目是假的。
单词hamster可以被排除，因为第一个(h到a)的转换是不允许的(在你的表中甚至不存在)。
现在，对于可能剩下的很少几个你没有删除的单词，试着按照你现在做的方法或在这里的其他答案中建议的方法在网格中找到它们。这是为了避免网格中相同字母之间的跳转导致的误报。例如，表格允许使用单词“help”，但网格不允许。
关于这个想法的一些进一步的性能改进技巧:
Instead of using a 2D array, use a 1D array and simply compute the index of the second letter yourself. So, instead of a 12x12 array like above, make a 1D array of length 144. If you then always use the same alphabet (i.e. a 26x26 = 676x1 array for the standard english alphabet), even if not all letters show up in your grid, you can pre-compute the indices into this 1D array that you need to test to match your dictionary words. For example, the indices for 'hello' in the example above would be
hello (6, 3, 8, 8, 10):
42 (from 6 + 3x12), 99, 104, 128
-> "hello" will be stored as 42, 99, 104, 128 in the dictionary
Extend the idea to a 3D table (expressed as a 1D array), i.e. all allowed 3-letter combinations. That way you can eliminate even more words immediately and you reduce the number of array lookups for each word by 1: For 'hello', you only need 3 array lookups: hel, ell, llo. It will be very quick to build this table, by the way, as there are only 400 possible 3-letter-moves in your grid.
Pre-compute the indices of the moves in your grid that you need to include in your table. For the example above, you need to set the following entries to 'True':
(0,0) (0,1) -> here: h, b : [6][0]
(0,0) (1,0) -> here: h, e : [6][3]
(0,0) (1,1) -> here: h, e : [6][3]
(0,1) (0,0) -> here: b, h : [0][6]
(0,1) (0,2) -> here: b, c : [0][1]
.
:
Also represent your game grid in a 1-D array with 16 entries and have the table pre-computed in 3. contain the indices into this array.
我相信如果您使用这种方法，您可以让您的代码运行得非常快，如果您预先计算了字典并已经加载到内存中。
顺便说一句:如果你正在创造一款游戏，你可以在后台立即运行这些内容。在用户仍然盯着你的应用标题屏幕，并将手指放在按“Play”的位置时开始生成和解决第一款游戏。然后在用户玩前一款游戏时生成并解决下一款游戏。这应该会给您很多时间来运行代码。
(我喜欢这个问题，所以我可能会忍不住在未来几天的某个时候用Java实现我的提议，看看它实际上是如何执行的……一旦我这样做，我将在这里张贴代码。)
更新:
好的，我今天有一些时间在Java中实现了这个想法:
class DictionaryEntry {
public int[] letters;
public int[] triplets;
}
class BoggleSolver {
// Constants
final int ALPHABET_SIZE = 5; // up to 2^5 = 32 letters
final int BOARD_SIZE = 4; // 4x4 board
final int[] moves = {-BOARD_SIZE-1, -BOARD_SIZE, -BOARD_SIZE+1,
-1, +1,
+BOARD_SIZE-1, +BOARD_SIZE, +BOARD_SIZE+1};
// Technically constant (calculated here for flexibility, but should be fixed)
DictionaryEntry[] dictionary; // Processed word list
int maxWordLength = 0;
int[] boardTripletIndices; // List of all 3-letter moves in board coordinates
DictionaryEntry[] buildDictionary(String fileName) throws IOException {
BufferedReader fileReader = new BufferedReader(new FileReader(fileName));
String word = fileReader.readLine();
ArrayList<DictionaryEntry> result = new ArrayList<DictionaryEntry>();
while (word!=null) {
if (word.length()>=3) {
word = word.toUpperCase();
if (word.length()>maxWordLength) maxWordLength = word.length();
DictionaryEntry entry = new DictionaryEntry();
entry.letters = new int[word.length() ];
entry.triplets = new int[word.length()-2];
int i=0;
for (char letter: word.toCharArray()) {
entry.letters[i] = (byte) letter - 65; // Convert ASCII to 0..25
if (i>=2)
entry.triplets[i-2] = (((entry.letters[i-2] << ALPHABET_SIZE) +
entry.letters[i-1]) << ALPHABET_SIZE) +
entry.letters[i];
i++;
}
result.add(entry);
}
word = fileReader.readLine();
}
return result.toArray(new DictionaryEntry[result.size()]);
}
boolean isWrap(int a, int b) { // Checks if move a->b wraps board edge (like 3->4)
return Math.abs(a%BOARD_SIZE-b%BOARD_SIZE)>1;
}
int[] buildTripletIndices() {
ArrayList<Integer> result = new ArrayList<Integer>();
for (int a=0; a<BOARD_SIZE*BOARD_SIZE; a++)
for (int bm: moves) {
int b=a+bm;
if ((b>=0) && (b<board.length) && !isWrap(a, b))
for (int cm: moves) {
int c=b+cm;
if ((c>=0) && (c<board.length) && (c!=a) && !isWrap(b, c)) {
result.add(a);
result.add(b);
result.add(c);
}
}
}
int[] result2 = new int[result.size()];
int i=0;
for (Integer r: result) result2[i++] = r;
return result2;
}
// Variables that depend on the actual game layout
int[] board = new int[BOARD_SIZE*BOARD_SIZE]; // Letters in board
boolean[] possibleTriplets = new boolean[1 << (ALPHABET_SIZE*3)];
DictionaryEntry[] candidateWords;
int candidateCount;
int[] usedBoardPositions;
DictionaryEntry[] foundWords;
int foundCount;
void initializeBoard(String[] letters) {
for (int row=0; row<BOARD_SIZE; row++)
for (int col=0; col<BOARD_SIZE; col++)
board[row*BOARD_SIZE + col] = (byte) letters[row].charAt(col) - 65;
}
void setPossibleTriplets() {
Arrays.fill(possibleTriplets, false); // Reset list
int i=0;
while (i<boardTripletIndices.length) {
int triplet = (((board[boardTripletIndices[i++]] << ALPHABET_SIZE) +
board[boardTripletIndices[i++]]) << ALPHABET_SIZE) +
board[boardTripletIndices[i++]];
possibleTriplets[triplet] = true;
}
}
void checkWordTriplets() {
candidateCount = 0;
for (DictionaryEntry entry: dictionary) {
boolean ok = true;
int len = entry.triplets.length;
for (int t=0; (t<len) && ok; t++)
ok = possibleTriplets[entry.triplets[t]];
if (ok) candidateWords[candidateCount++] = entry;
}
}
void checkWords() { // Can probably be optimized a lot
foundCount = 0;
for (int i=0; i<candidateCount; i++) {
DictionaryEntry candidate = candidateWords[i];
for (int j=0; j<board.length; j++)
if (board[j]==candidate.letters[0]) {
usedBoardPositions[0] = j;
if (checkNextLetters(candidate, 1, j)) {
foundWords[foundCount++] = candidate;
break;
}
}
}
}
boolean checkNextLetters(DictionaryEntry candidate, int letter, int pos) {
if (letter==candidate.letters.length) return true;
int match = candidate.letters[letter];
for (int move: moves) {
int next=pos+move;
if ((next>=0) && (next<board.length) && (board[next]==match) && !isWrap(pos, next)) {
boolean ok = true;
for (int i=0; (i<letter) && ok; i++)
ok = usedBoardPositions[i]!=next;
if (ok) {
usedBoardPositions[letter] = next;
if (checkNextLetters(candidate, letter+1, next)) return true;
}
}
}
return false;
}
// Just some helper functions
String formatTime(long start, long end, long repetitions) {
long time = (end-start)/repetitions;
return time/1000000 + "." + (time/100000) % 10 + "" + (time/10000) % 10 + "ms";
}
String getWord(DictionaryEntry entry) {
char[] result = new char[entry.letters.length];
int i=0;
for (int letter: entry.letters)
result[i++] = (char) (letter+97);
return new String(result);
}
void run() throws IOException {
long start = System.nanoTime();
// The following can be pre-computed and should be replaced by constants
dictionary = buildDictionary("C:/TWL06.txt");
boardTripletIndices = buildTripletIndices();
long precomputed = System.nanoTime();
// The following only needs to run once at the beginning of the program
candidateWords = new DictionaryEntry[dictionary.length]; // WAAAY too generous
foundWords = new DictionaryEntry[dictionary.length]; // WAAAY too generous
usedBoardPositions = new int[maxWordLength];
long initialized = System.nanoTime();
for (int n=1; n<=100; n++) {
// The following needs to run again for every new board
initializeBoard(new String[] {"DGHI",
"KLPS",
"YEUT",
"EORN"});
setPossibleTriplets();
checkWordTriplets();
checkWords();
}
long solved = System.nanoTime();
// Print out result and statistics
System.out.println("Precomputation finished in " + formatTime(start, precomputed, 1)+":");
System.out.println(" Words in the dictionary: "+dictionary.length);
System.out.println(" Longest word: "+maxWordLength+" letters");
System.out.println(" Number of triplet-moves: "+boardTripletIndices.length/3);
System.out.println();
System.out.println("Initialization finished in " + formatTime(precomputed, initialized, 1));
System.out.println();
System.out.println("Board solved in "+formatTime(initialized, solved, 100)+":");
System.out.println(" Number of candidates: "+candidateCount);
System.out.println(" Number of actual words: "+foundCount);
System.out.println();
System.out.println("Words found:");
int w=0;
System.out.print(" ");
for (int i=0; i<foundCount; i++) {
System.out.print(getWord(foundWords[i]));
w++;
if (w==10) {
w=0;
System.out.println(); System.out.print(" ");
} else
if (i<foundCount-1) System.out.print(", ");
}
System.out.println();
}
public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException {
new BoggleSolver().run();
}
}
以下是一些结果:
对于原始问题(DGHI…)中发布的图片的网格:
Precomputation finished in 239.59ms:
Words in the dictionary: 178590
Longest word: 15 letters
Number of triplet-moves: 408
Initialization finished in 0.22ms
Board solved in 3.70ms:
Number of candidates: 230
Number of actual words: 163
Words found:
eek, eel, eely, eld, elhi, elk, ern, erupt, erupts, euro
eye, eyer, ghi, ghis, glee, gley, glue, gluer, gluey, glut
gluts, hip, hiply, hips, his, hist, kelp, kelps, kep, kepi
kepis, keps, kept, kern, key, kye, lee, lek, lept, leu
ley, lunt, lunts, lure, lush, lust, lustre, lye, nus, nut
nuts, ore, ort, orts, ouph, ouphs, our, oust, out, outre
outs, oyer, pee, per, pert, phi, phis, pis, pish, plus
plush, ply, plyer, psi, pst, pul, pule, puler, pun, punt
punts, pur, pure, puree, purely, pus, push, put, puts, ree
rely, rep, reply, reps, roe, roue, roup, roups, roust, rout
routs, rue, rule, ruly, run, runt, runts, rupee, rush, rust
rut, ruts, ship, shlep, sip, sipe, spue, spun, spur, spurn
spurt, strep, stroy, stun, stupe, sue, suer, sulk, sulker, sulky
sun, sup, supe, super, sure, surely, tree, trek, trey, troupe
troy, true, truly, tule, tun, tup, tups, turn, tush, ups
urn, uts, yeld, yelk, yelp, yelps, yep, yeps, yore, you
your, yourn, yous
对于在原始问题中作为示例发布的信件(FXIE…)
Precomputation finished in 239.68ms:
Words in the dictionary: 178590
Longest word: 15 letters
Number of triplet-moves: 408
Initialization finished in 0.21ms
Board solved in 3.69ms:
Number of candidates: 87
Number of actual words: 76
Words found:
amble, ambo, ami, amie, asea, awa, awe, awes, awl, axil
axile, axle, boil, bole, box, but, buts, east, elm, emboli
fame, fames, fax, lei, lie, lima, limb, limbo, limbs, lime
limes, lob, lobs, lox, mae, maes, maw, maws, max, maxi
mesa, mew, mewl, mews, mil, mile, milo, mix, oil, ole
sae, saw, sea, seam, semi, sew, stub, swam, swami, tub
tubs, tux, twa, twae, twaes, twas, uts, wae, waes, wamble
wame, wames, was, wast, wax, west
对于以下5x5网格:
R P R I T
A H H L N
I E T E P
Z R Y S G
O G W E Y
它给出了这个:
Precomputation finished in 240.39ms:
Words in the dictionary: 178590
Longest word: 15 letters
Number of triplet-moves: 768
Initialization finished in 0.23ms
Board solved in 3.85ms:
Number of candidates: 331
Number of actual words: 240
Words found:
aero, aery, ahi, air, airt, airth, airts, airy, ear, egest
elhi, elint, erg, ergo, ester, eth, ether, eye, eyen, eyer
eyes, eyre, eyrie, gel, gelt, gelts, gen, gent, gentil, gest
geste, get, gets, gey, gor, gore, gory, grey, greyest, greys
gyre, gyri, gyro, hae, haet, haets, hair, hairy, hap, harp
heap, hear, heh, heir, help, helps, hen, hent, hep, her
hero, hes, hest, het, hetero, heth, hets, hey, hie, hilt
hilts, hin, hint, hire, hit, inlet, inlets, ire, leg, leges
legs, lehr, lent, les, lest, let, lethe, lets, ley, leys
lin, line, lines, liney, lint, lit, neg, negs, nest, nester
net, nether, nets, nil, nit, ogre, ore, orgy, ort, orts
pah, pair, par, peg, pegs, peh, pelt, pelter, peltry, pelts
pen, pent, pes, pest, pester, pesty, pet, peter, pets, phi
philter, philtre, phiz, pht, print, pst, rah, rai, rap, raphe
raphes, reap, rear, rei, ret, rete, rets, rhaphe, rhaphes, rhea
ria, rile, riles, riley, rin, rye, ryes, seg, sel, sen
sent, senti, set, sew, spelt, spelter, spent, splent, spline, splint
split, stent, step, stey, stria, striae, sty, stye, tea, tear
teg, tegs, tel, ten, tent, thae, the, their, then, these
thesp, they, thin, thine, thir, thirl, til, tile, tiles, tilt
tilter, tilth, tilts, tin, tine, tines, tirl, trey, treys, trog
try, tye, tyer, tyes, tyre, tyro, west, wester, wry, wryest
wye, wyes, wyte, wytes, yea, yeah, year, yeh, yelp, yelps
yen, yep, yeps, yes, yester, yet, yew, yews, zero, zori
为此，我使用了TWL06锦标赛拼字词列表，因为原始问题中的链接不再有效。这个文件是1.85MB，所以略短一些。buildDictionary函数抛出所有小于3个字母的单词。
以下是对其性能的一些观察:
It's about 10 times slower than the reported performance of Victor Nicollet's OCaml implementation. Whether this is caused by the different algorithm, the shorter dictionary he used, the fact that his code is compiled and mine runs in a Java virtual machine, or the performance of our computers (mine is an Intel Q6600 @ 2.4MHz running WinXP), I don't know. But it's much faster than the results for the other implementations quoted at the end of the original question. So, whether this algorithm is superior to the trie dictionary or not, I don't know at this point.
The table method used in checkWordTriplets() yields a very good approximation to the actual answers. Only 1 in 3-5 words passed by it will fail the checkWords() test (See number of candidates vs. number of actual words above).
Something you can't see above: The checkWordTriplets() function takes about 3.65ms and is therefore fully dominant in the search process. The checkWords() function takes up pretty much the remaining 0.05-0.20 ms.
The execution time of the checkWordTriplets() function depends linearly on the dictionary size and is virtually independent of board size!
The execution time of checkWords() depends on the board size and the number of words not ruled out by checkWordTriplets().
The checkWords() implementation above is the dumbest first version I came up with. It is basically not optimized at all. But compared to checkWordTriplets() it is irrelevant for the total performance of the application, so I didn't worry about it. But, if the board size gets bigger, this function will get slower and slower and will eventually start to matter. Then, it would need to be optimized as well.
One nice thing about this code is its flexibility:
You can easily change the board size: Update line 10 and the String array passed to initializeBoard().
It can support larger/different alphabets and can handle things like treating 'Qu' as one letter without any performance overhead. To do this, one would need to update line 9 and the couple of places where characters are converted to numbers (currently simply by subtracting 65 from the ASCII value)
好吧，但我觉得现在这篇文章已经足够长了。我当然可以回答你可能有的任何问题，但让我们把它转移到评论。
