/foobar

Solutions to the Google foobar challenges made to me

Primary LanguagePythonMIT LicenseMIT

$$e^{\pi i}+1=0$$

One day I googled something about Python. I don't even remember what. When I clicked on one of the links (It was a link to StackOverflow) it didn't navigate to the target, but the page from Google transformed into a console and offered some entertaining challenges to be solved by programming either in Java or in Python. Each challenge was posed with a back story of lambs, bunnies, Commander Lambda and whatnot. Each one came with one or two basic test cases with the expected output while the code could be 'verified' against some secret test cases that you never see.

I didn't save the original statements of the challenges, or most of the original given test cases. These are my reformulations and my solutions.

Since there were too few challenges, and I felt like doing some more, I searched challenges given to some other people and added here what would be my solutions.

No guarantee that they will work. While the solutions I submitted passed their secret test cases, that is no proof that they are correct in every case. Also, I might have done some changes to the code since I submitted them. Among the changes there are many more comments than in the original versions.

For the extra challenges from other people, they are not even tested against Google's testcases.

This is just for fun anyway.


The funny thing is that when you solve the foo.bar challenge, they do call you and invite you to be interviewed! So, if you happen to get an invitation to the foo.bar challenge, do solve it. The onsite interview includes a free lunch! :D The whole interview is a lot of fun.

I cannot publish the questions that they asked me. You have to sign a legal document agreeing to not do so. If you breach the contract with Google you know what happens? Google takes your entire search history and sends it to your mum! :D All of it!

On the Other/ directory I put some algorithms that I learned while studying for the interview. For actual programmers all of those are probably well known stuff, but for me they look interesting and are fresh knowledge that I acquired because Google decided to intrude in my peaceful existence.

"Make you late for dinner!" :)


It is 2020 I happened to check back in the foobar site and now they are giving me new problems! Before, it would only say to come back later. More fun is on the way! And it looks like the problems are not starting easy and getting harder. The first one made me study mathematics that I had used only once before, in a homework in graduate school. (Well, I guess it was luck of the draw. Some problems later are being simpler.)

Quote from one of the problems:

"Because Commander Lambda is an equal-opportunity despot, she has several visually-impaired minions ..."

LOL!

Well, finished all the challenges. They don't have more for me. At least at the moment.