C#•17mo ago

❔ Convert void to bool

I know that this question is totally weird and I would never try to use this in clean/maintainable code. However that is not my goal. I'm writing code for Sebastian Lague's Chess Bot Tournament and try to reduce the number of tokens in code (and cannot use unsafe environments). I have three functions like this:

void A() {}
bool B() => false || true; //return value is obviously not the same every time
void C() {}

void A() {}
bool B() => false || true; //return value is obviously not the same every time
void C() {}

And I want to execute them in order and keep the return value of B(). One way to accomplish is like that:

string Execute()
{
    A();
    bool res = B();
    C();
    return res ? "Result 1" : "Result 2";
}

string Execute()
{
    A();
    bool res = B();
    C();
    return res ? "Result 1" : "Result 2";
}

But it seems to be not the optimal way to minimize tokens. I would except to be a workaround like this:

string Execute2() => A().toFalse() || (B() && C().toTrue()) ? "Yes" : "No";

string Execute2() => A().toFalse() || (B() && C().toTrue()) ? "Yes" : "No";

However, I was unable to find a way to bodge the toTrue/toFalse statements and Google didn't help because it just shows questions of people not understanding what void is. One could obviously wrap A in a function, which invokes it and returns a bool but it generates to many "boilerplat" tokens. Is there any way to achieve this or is C# to securely designed to do this?

15 Replies

anita•17mo ago

Can you change the methods a and c?

HeiholfOP•17mo ago

No, they are given methods

anita•17mo ago

Then I think the only option is to wrap it in a normal method or a lambda.

HeiholfOP•17mo ago

I think you are correct. But sadly a function or a lambda create more tokens as the first option.

anita•17mo ago

I actually also participate in this challenge so I‘m facing the same problems.

canton7•17mo ago

Reading the definition of a token... Do those two versions of the code have different numbers of tokens?

All names (variables, functions, etc.) are counted as a single token, regardless of length. This means that both lines of code: bool a = true; and bool myObscenelyLongVariableName = true; count the same. Additionally, the following things do not count towards the limit: white space, new lines, comments, access modifiers, commas, and semicolons.

Newlines, semicolons, whitespace don't count. Just variable and function names I guess res counts But wouldn't your toFalse count?

HeiholfOP•17mo ago

I haven't counted directly but the second version would lead to a syntax change somewhere else which would overall reduce tokens

canton7•17mo ago

I guess you might be able to do something like:

try
{
    A();
    return B();
}
finally
{
    C();
}

try
{
    A();
    return B();
}
finally
{
    C();
}

No idea whether try and finally count

HeiholfOP•17mo ago

It would probably count, maybe even as 2 or 3 tokens but I can say for certain because I dont know of a way to accomplish the functionality Tha's a very clever idea, according to the token counter it is equivalent to the first method but there might be room for optimization

Omnissiah•17mo ago

i was thinking like

List<object> fs = new() { (object)A, (object)B, (object)C };
bool bool_result;
fs.ForEach(f => { if (f is Action a) a(); else bool_result = ((Func<bool>)f)();  });

List<object> fs = new() { (object)A, (object)B, (object)C };
bool bool_result;
fs.ForEach(f => { if (f is Action a) a(); else bool_result = ((Func<bool>)f)();  });

but maybe i'm uselessly complicating things i don't really know what token means maybe this

bool bool_result = false;
await Task.WhenAll(new[] {
    new Func<Task>(async () => jvoid())(),
    new Func<Task>(async () => { bool_result = rbool(); })(),
    new Func<Task>(async () => jvoid())()
});
return bool_result;

bool bool_result = false;
await Task.WhenAll(new[] {
    new Func<Task>(async () => jvoid())(),
    new Func<Task>(async () => { bool_result = rbool(); })(),
    new Func<Task>(async () => jvoid())()
});
return bool_result;

slightly less verbose

bool b = false;
return (bool)(Action.Combine(A, () => () => b = B(), C).DynamicInvoke() ?? b);

bool b = false;
return (bool)(Action.Combine(A, () => () => b = B(), C).DynamicInvoke() ?? b);

also i don't get what this doesn't work

return (bool)Action.Combine(new[] { ((Action)A).DynamicInvoke, ((Delegate)B).DynamicInvoke, ((Action)C).DynamicInvoke }).DynamicInvoke();

but this works

return new[] { ((Action)A).DynamicInvoke, ((Delegate)B).DynamicInvoke, ((Action)C).DynamicInvoke }.Select(_ => _()).OfType<bool>().Single();

return new[] { ((Action)A).DynamicInvoke, ((Delegate)B).DynamicInvoke, ((Action)C).DynamicInvoke }.Select(_ => _()).OfType<bool>().Single();

HeiholfOP•17mo ago

This is definitely the closest way to "convert void to bools" but it sadly is too verbose because a token is a keyword, a opening/closing brace/bracket/parenthesis, dot, comma, semicolon, type name, variable name or any "atomic" element of code (some of these are excluded by the rules of the contest).

Omnissiah•17mo ago

so a brief description would be "lexical entity", we shall say

canton7•17mo ago

The description I read on the website explicitly excluded things like semicolons

HeiholfOP•17mo ago

That's correct in general a token is anything described above but the contest excludes: SyntaxKind.PrivateKeyword, SyntaxKind.PublicKeyword, SyntaxKind.SemicolonToken, SyntaxKind.CommaToken, SyntaxKind.CloseBraceToken, SyntaxKind.CloseBracketToken, SyntaxKind.CloseParenToken

Accord•16mo ago

Was this issue resolved? If so, run /close - otherwise I will mark this as stale and this post will be archived until there is new activity.

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❔ Convert void to bool