----------------------------------- Panphobia Sun Nov 18, 2012 11:03 pm BFS algorithm in grids/mazes ----------------------------------- Ok so I know the concept of a BFS, but the thing is I still do not know exactly how to implement it. I am just asking how would I lets say with a BFS, in either java or python, doesnt matter really, get the shortest path from A-B with this grid/maze and the # are walls [code]A......... ##....##.. .####...## .......... .......### B......... ####...### .......... #...#.###. ..........[/code] If you could explain it in laymens terms, or a code example would be great! ----------------------------------- DemonWasp Mon Nov 19, 2012 1:15 am RE:BFS algorithm in grids/mazes ----------------------------------- A Breadth-First Search works like this: [code] nodes-to-search = {node A} while nodes-to-search is not empty, do: get closest from nodes-to-search if closest is B, then return the path stored in closest else add neighbours(closest) to nodes-to-search (ignoring nodes which have already been searched or are duplicates [/code] There's some complication to computing the path, but it works like this: - when you add neighbours(closest), assign "closest" as the "parent" of each neighbour - then the "parent" of each node points to the node it was discovered from - by following one parent to the next, you can get from B to A - reverse that path to get from A to B ----------------------------------- Panphobia Mon Nov 19, 2012 1:18 am RE:BFS algorithm in grids/mazes ----------------------------------- So node-to-search is a set? ----------------------------------- mirhagk Mon Nov 19, 2012 9:11 am RE:BFS algorithm in grids/mazes ----------------------------------- Hey DemonWasp, I think you're confusing dijisktras with BFS. Breadth First Search is nearly identical to Depth First Search, the difference being which node you check next. With DFS you check the last node you discovered whereas with BFS you check the first one you discovered. Essentially you get a queue (which is something that you add items to the end, but get items from the front, so the items you get are the first items you get out. It's FIFO unlike stacks which are LIFO). Every time you discover a new node you add it to the queue, and each time in the while loop you grab the first thing from the queue, and check if it's the end, and if not you add new neighbours to the queue. ----------------------------------- mirhagk Mon Nov 19, 2012 9:31 am Re: BFS algorithm in grids/mazes ----------------------------------- def DFS(x,y,Map): if (Map As you can see from this updated example (from the one I sent you). BFS is very similar to DFS, with only the order you check nodes changed. The example map has been changed to show that DFS and BFS often find very different solutions, and that BFS allows finds a path that has the shortest number of nodes, whereas DFS does not. You could also create many optimizations from this, but you need to make sure you understand the algorithm before you do so. ----------------------------------- Panphobia Mon Nov 19, 2012 9:51 am RE:BFS algorithm in grids/mazes ----------------------------------- so this is a BFS right? not a DFS because your method tells me its DFS O: ----------------------------------- Panphobia Mon Nov 19, 2012 9:53 am RE:BFS algorithm in grids/mazes ----------------------------------- never mind lol, i will try to convert the bfs to java :D ----------------------------------- mirhagk Mon Nov 19, 2012 9:54 am RE:BFS algorithm in grids/mazes ----------------------------------- The code includes both a BFS and a DFS for comparison. The 2nd method is BFS, the first is DFS ----------------------------------- Panphobia Mon Nov 19, 2012 10:20 am Re: BFS algorithm in grids/mazes ----------------------------------- This is my current code edited from yours, how does it not work [code]import collections def BFS(x,y,Map): queue = collections.deque( [(x,y,None)]) #create queue while len(queue)>0: #make sure there are nodes to check left node = queue.popleft() #grab the first node x = node[0] #get x and y y = node[1] if Map[x][y] == "B": #check if it's an exit return GetPathFromNodes(node) #if it is then return the path if (Map[x][y]!="*"): #if it's not a path, we can't try this spot continue Map[x][y]="explored" #make this spot explored so we don't try again for i in [[x-1,y],[x+1,y],[x,y-1],[x,y+1]]: #new spots to try queue.append((i[0],i[1],node))#create the new spot, with node as the parent return [] def GetPathFromNodes(node): path = [] while(node != None): path.append((node[0],node[1])) node = node[2] return path def GetMap(): return [ ["#","#","#","#","#","#","#","#"], ["#","A","*","*","*","*","*","#"], ["#","#","#","*","#","*","*","#"], ["#","*","*","*","#","#","*","#"], ["#","*","#","*","*","*","*","#"], ["#","*","#","#","#","#","*","#"], ["#","*","*","*","*","*","*","#"], ["#","#","#","B","#","#","#","#"] ] def DrawMap(Map,path): for x in range(0,len(Map)): for y in range(0,len(Map[x])): if ((x,y) in path): assert Map[x][y] in ("*","B") print("-") elif (Map[x][y]=="#"): print() elif (Map[x][y]=="B"): print(".") else: print(' ') print() print("solved with BFS") print("path is ",len(BFS(1,1,GetMap()))," spots long") DrawMap(GetMap(),BFS(1,1,GetMap())) [/code] ----------------------------------- mirhagk Mon Nov 19, 2012 10:28 am RE:BFS algorithm in grids/mazes ----------------------------------- Change A to * in your map. The starting point should be determined by the caller, not the map. If the starting point isn't * then it stops searching instantly. You've also really messed up the DrawMap part. It should look like [code] if ((x,y) in path): assert Map[x][y] in ("*","B") print("-",end="") elif (Map[x][y]=="#"): print("#",end="") elif (Map[x][y]=="B"): print(".",end="") else: print(' ',end="") [/code] ----------------------------------- Panphobia Mon Nov 19, 2012 10:38 am RE:BFS algorithm in grids/mazes ----------------------------------- Yea but its an error at print(end=) and i had to take it out ----------------------------------- DemonWasp Mon Nov 19, 2012 10:50 am Re: RE:BFS algorithm in grids/mazes ----------------------------------- ...confusing dijisktras with BFS... Nope. Dijkstra's algorithm is completely different. For one, it uses edge weights, which BFS ignores. The pseudocode I wrote out is almost exactly identical to what's displayed on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breadth-first_search ----------------------------------- Panphobia Mon Nov 19, 2012 11:19 am RE:BFS algorithm in grids/mazes ----------------------------------- I got it to work, now the problem is, it takes like 5 seconds to execute, is there a quicker algorithm because dwite it needs to be less than 2.5 seconds ----------------------------------- mirhagk Mon Nov 19, 2012 11:54 am RE:BFS algorithm in grids/mazes ----------------------------------- Oh yeah there are lots better algorithms. Both DFS and BFS are brute force solutions. Depending on your problem Djikstras or A* could be very beneficial. Basically if you can come up with an estimate of how close something is to the answer you can use A*. In general most of the problems require semi-unique solutions, because brute forcing is very easy in some languages (imperative languages especially), and they are meant to require at least some thought. @DemonWasp Sorry I was confused by your variable names, nodes-to-search and closest. It seemed like you were doing some sort of sorting of the queue, which I now see you aren't. Your pseudo-code isn't really specific on what node to grab next, which is the only difference between many of these graph searching algorithms (In fact djikstras is just that pseudo code where you grab the node that has the least sum of the edge nodes, and A* is just the same except you add a heuristic to the calcuation etc etc). The pseudo code is really more suited to a generic method for searching. ----------------------------------- Panphobia Mon Nov 19, 2012 12:11 pm RE:BFS algorithm in grids/mazes ----------------------------------- hmmmm i just searched dijkstra on wikipedia, and the pseudocode is making me very sad lol. Could you code up a quick example using dijkstra or A*, and also is Lee's Algorithm good for this situation? ----------------------------------- mirhagk Mon Nov 19, 2012 3:15 pm RE:BFS algorithm in grids/mazes ----------------------------------- If the edge sizes are the same then Dijkstra is the exact same as BFS. If A* has a heuristic of 0 (ie you don't have a way to estimate how close you are) then it's the same as Dijkstra. Because of the above 2 properties neither A* nor Dijkstra helps any with the example I've been using. We can't guess how far away we are from the end because we don't know where the end is. Therefore our A* is Dijkstra. Every movement we make is the same distance (it takes just as long to go left as it does to go right etc). That means that every edge size is the same, so any Dijkstra would just be BFS. ----------------------------------- Panphobia Mon Nov 19, 2012 3:53 pm RE:BFS algorithm in grids/mazes ----------------------------------- So if dijkstra just be BFS would it execute any faster? If not which algorithm would execute faster, and is lee's algorithm good? ----------------------------------- mirhagk Mon Nov 19, 2012 4:59 pm RE:BFS algorithm in grids/mazes ----------------------------------- since the algorithms operate equivalently, the simplest one would be the fastest, so BFS would be the fastest. Lee's algorithm looks interesting, but it just looks like a different (maybe more inefficient) way to do BFS. I don't really see a difference in the algorithm itself, but I don't know (I'm just going off of the wikipedia page) ----------------------------------- Panphobia Mon Nov 19, 2012 5:23 pm RE:BFS algorithm in grids/mazes ----------------------------------- thing is, the BFS runs in 4-5 seconds when it needs to be < 2.5s, soooo which algorithm would you recommend ----------------------------------- mirhagk Mon Nov 19, 2012 5:41 pm RE:BFS algorithm in grids/mazes ----------------------------------- what is the exact problem? ----------------------------------- Panphobia Mon Nov 19, 2012 6:32 pm Re: BFS algorithm in grids/mazes ----------------------------------- So here is my code for a bfs from A to B in a grid,I checked some other code and edited it to fit mine, is it alright, and is it efficient enough? [code]package bfs; import java.util.*; import java.io.*; public class BFS { public static void main(String[] args) { int c = 0; String text = "A........." + "##....##.." + ".####...##" + ".........." + ".......###" + ".....#...." + "####...###" + "B........." + "#...#.###." + ".........."; char[][] maze = new char[10][10]; for (int x = 0; x < 10; x++) { for (int y = 0; y < 10; y++) { maze[x][y] = text.charAt(c); c += 1; } } System.out.println(bfs(maze, 0, 0, '#')); } public static int bfs(char[][] maze, int x, int y, char wall) { Queue queue = new LinkedList(); int[] start = {y, x, 0}; queue.add(start); while (queue.peek() != null) { int[] array = queue.remove(); if (array[0] - 1 > -1 && maze[array[0] - 1][array[1]] != wall) { if (maze[array[0] - 1][array[1]] == 'B') { return array[2] + 1; } else { maze[array[0] - 1][array[1]] = wall; int[] temp = {array[0] - 1, array[1], array[2] + 1}; queue.add(temp); } } if (array[1] - 1 > -1 && maze[array[0]][array[1] - 1] != wall) { if (maze[array[0]][array[1] - 1] == 'B') { return array[2] + 1; } else { maze[array[0]][array[1] - 1] = wall; int[] temp = {array[0], array[1] - 1, array[2] + 1}; queue.add(temp); } } if (array[1] + 1 < 10 && maze[array[0]][array[1] + 1] != wall) { if (maze[array[0]][array[1] + 1] == 'B') { return array[2] + 1; } else { maze[array[0]][array[1] + 1] = wall; int[] temp = {array[0], array[1] + 1, array[2] + 1}; queue.add(temp); } } if (array[0] + 1 < 10 && maze[array[0] + 1][array[1]] != wall) { if (maze[array[0] + 1][array[1]] == 'B') { return array[2] + 1; } else { maze[array[0] + 1][array[1]] = wall; int[] temp = {array[0] + 1, array[1], array[2] + 1}; queue.add(temp); } } } return 0; } } [/code]