CODEWITHSUNDEEP
clojure
GitCrush
GitCrush

Reputation: 113

Function composition with variable function arguments

I am currently struggling with an assignment to create an anonymous function, in order to fulfil the following test cases:

I came up with the solution:

(fn [& fs]
(fn [& items] (reduce #(%2 %1) 
    (flatten items) 
        (reverse fs))))

My idea was to create a list of the functions bound to the outer function, and then to apply a reducer on this function list, beginning with array "items". As this works fine for chaining single arity functions in test cases 1 and 2, I have no idea how to modify the inner Lambda-function, in order to deal with multi-arity functions:

(apply + ___ )    ;; first function argument of test case 3
(take 5 ___ )     ;; first function argument of test case 4

Is there still a way to get around this problem? Many thanks!

Source: 4Clojure - Problem 58

Addendum: I came across a "funky" solution using:

(fn [& fs] (reduce (fn [f g] #(f (apply g %&))) fs))

I don't fully understand this approach, to be honest...

Addendum 2: There was a similar discussion on this topic 7 years ago: Clojure: Implementing the comp function

There I found the following solution:

(fn [& xs]
  (fn [& ys]
    (reduce #(%2 %1)
            (apply (last xs) ys) (rest (reverse xs)))))

However, I still do not understand how we are able to kick off the reducer on the expression (apply (last xs) ys) , which represents the left-most function in the function chain. In test case 1, that would translate to (apply rest [1 2 3 4]), which is wrong.

Upvotes: 1

Views: 263

Answers (2)

Aaron Bell
Aaron Bell

Reputation: 862

The first two test cases have the rest params: [[1 2 3 4]], not [1 2 3 4].

So it's not (apply rest [1 2 3 4]) but (apply rest [[1 2 3 4]]) or (rest [1 2 3 4]).

To drill it home:

(rest-ex [& rst]
  rst
)
(rst 1 2 3) ;;=> [1 2 3]
(rst [1 2] 3) ;;=> [[1 2] 3]
(rst [1 2 3]) ;;=> [[1 2 3]]

Using apply:

; rest example one
(apply + [1 2 3]) ;;=> 6
; rest example two
(apply conj [[1 2] 3]) ;;=> [1 2 3]
; rest example three
(apply reverse [[1 2 3]]) ;;=> (3 2 1)

For both your funky solution and comp itself, it's like taking a car (the first function), beefing it up with a turbo, installing speakers (the following function). The car, w/ the turbo and amazing sound system, is available for the next group of friends to use (the apply turns it from a one-seat stock car to having as many "seats" as you want). In your case, the reducer function uses apply w/ a rest parameter, so it's like offering the option for more doors w/ each function added (but it chooses one door anyway).

The first two test cases are simple, and reduce isn't needed but can be used.

;; [[1 2 3 4]]
;; [rest reverse]

((fn [& fs] (reduce (fn [f g] #(f (apply g %&))) fs)) rest reverse) ;; is functionally equivalent to
((fn [& fs] #((first fs) (apply (second fs) %&))) rest reverse) 
#(rest (apply reverse %&)) 

;; So

(((fn [& fs] (reduce (fn [f g] #(f (apply g %&))) fs)) rest reverse) [1 2 3 4]) ;; (3 2 1)
(((fn [& fs] #((first fs) (apply (second fs) %&))) rest reverse) [1 2 3 4]) ;; (3 2)
(#(rest (apply reverse %&)) [1 2 3 4]) ;;=> (3 2 1)

The third test case, on the second round of reduce, after it's started, looks like:

;; [3 5 7 9]
;; [zero? #(mod % 8) +]
;;    ^      ^           The reducer function runs against these two f's
;; Which turns the original:
(fn [& fs] (reduce (fn [f g] #(f (apply g %&))) fs))
;; into an equivalent: 
(reduce #(zero? (apply (fn [v] (mod v 8)) [g])) [+])
;; which ultimately results in (wow!):
((fn [& args] (zero? (apply (fn [v] (mod v 8)) [(apply + args)]))) 3 5 7 9)

Pay careful attention to the %& in the reducer function. that's why I wrapped (apply + args) in a vector.

While going through this, I realized what I intuited from my use of reduce is a tiny bit more involved than I realized--esp. w/ function composition, rest params, and apply at play.

It's not that simple, but it's understandable.

Upvotes: 2

Simon Polak
Simon Polak

Reputation: 1989

This is very similar to how comp is implemented in clojure.core.


(defn my-comp
  ([f] f)
  ([f g]
   (fn
     ([] (f (g)))
     ([x] (f (g x)))
     ([x y] (f (g x y)))
     ([x y & args] (f (apply g x y args)))))
  ([f g & fs]
   (reduce my-comp (list* f g fs))))

The key to understanding higher order function like comp is to think about what needs to happen when we compose functions. What is the simplest case ? (comp f) Comp only receiving a single function, so we just return that function, there is no composition yet. How about second most simple case: Comp receiving two functions, like (comp f g), now we need to return another function which when called, does the composition, like (f (g)). But this returned function needs to support zero or more arguments, so we make it variadic. Why does it need to support zero or more arguments ? Because of function g, the inner most function can have zero or more arguments.

For example: what does (comp dec inc) return ? It returns this fn:

  (fn
     ([] (dec (inc)))
     ([x] (dec (inc x)))
     ([x y] (dec (inc x y)))
     ([x y & args] (dec (apply inc x y args)))))

It assumes that inc (the inner most function which gets executed first) could receive zero or more args. But in reality inc only supports one argument, so you would get the arity exception if you called this function with more than one argument like this ((comp dec inc) 1 2), but calling it with single argument would work, because the inner most function inc has a single arity, ((comp dec inc) 10). I hope I am clear here, why this returned function needs to be variadic.

Now for the next step, what if we compose three or more functions ? This is simple now, because the bread and butter was already implemented with two argument function that my-comp supports. So we just call this 2 argument function while we reduce through a list of supplied functions. Each step returns a new function which wraps the input function.

Upvotes: 2

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