StringgnirtSStringgnirtSStringgnirtS

Question

Here is a relatively simple challenge for you.

Given a string of length N, output the string forwards, then backwards, then forwards, then backwards... etc. N times. For example, if your input was

Hello!

You should output:

Hello!!olleHHello!!olleHHello!!olleH

You may also optionally output one trailing newline.

Your submission may be either a full program or a function, and you may take input and output in any reasonable format. For example, you may take IO from STDIN/STDOUT, function arguments and return value, from a file, etc. You can safely assume that the input string will not be empty, and will only contain printable ASCII. You must output the new string on a single line. So, for example, if the output to the last example was

Hello!
!olleH
Hello!
!olleH
Hello!
!olleH

This would not be a valid solution!

Here are some more test cases:

Input:
a
Output:
a

Input:
abcd
Output:
abcddcbaabcddcba

Input:
OK!
Output:
OK!!KOOK!

Input:
4815162342
Output:
4815162342243261518448151623422432615184481516234224326151844815162342243261518448151623422432615184

Input:
PPCG
Output:
PPCGGCPPPPCGGCPP

Input:
42
Output:
4224

Leaderboards

Since this is a code-golf challenge, standard loopholes are banned, and the shortest answer in bytes wins! However, this is also a competition to have the shortest answer in any particular langauge. While it's unlikely that a Java answer will beat an answer in perl, or some golfing language, it's still very impressive to have the shortest Java answer. So, you can use this leaderboard to see both

1. The shortest answer out of all languages, and

2. The shortest answer in each individual language.

To make sure that your answer shows up, please start your answer with a headline, using the following Markdown template:

# Language Name, N bytes

where N is the size of your submission. If you improve your score, you can keep old scores in the headline, by striking them through. For instance:

# Ruby, <s>104</s> <s>101</s> 96 bytes

If there you want to include multiple numbers in your header (e.g. because your score is the sum of two files or you want to list interpreter flag penalties separately), make sure that the actual score is the last number in the header:

# Perl, 43 + 2 (-p flag) = 45 bytes

You can also make the language name a link which will then show up in the leaderboard snippet:

# [><>](http://esolangs.org/wiki/Fish), 121 bytes

var QUESTION_ID=93261,OVERRIDE_USER=31716;function answersUrl(e){return"https://api.stackexchange.com/2.2/questions/"+QUESTION_ID+"/answers?page="+e+"&pagesize=100&order=desc&sort=creation&site=codegolf&filter="+ANSWER_FILTER}function commentUrl(e,s){return"https://api.stackexchange.com/2.2/answers/"+s.join(";")+"/comments?page="+e+"&pagesize=100&order=desc&sort=creation&site=codegolf&filter="+COMMENT_FILTER}function getAnswers(){jQuery.ajax({url:answersUrl(answer_page++),method:"get",dataType:"jsonp",crossDomain:!0,success:function(e){answers.push.apply(answers,e.items),answers_hash=[],answer_ids=[],e.items.forEach(function(e){e.comments=[];var s=+e.share_link.match(/\d+/);answer_ids.push(s),answers_hash[s]=e}),e.has_more||(more_answers=!1),comment_page=1,getComments()}})}function getComments(){jQuery.ajax({url:commentUrl(comment_page++,answer_ids),method:"get",dataType:"jsonp",crossDomain:!0,success:function(e){e.items.forEach(function(e){e.owner.user_id===OVERRIDE_USER&&answers_hash[e.post_id].comments.push(e)}),e.has_more?getComments():more_answers?getAnswers():process()}})}function getAuthorName(e){return e.owner.display_name}function process(){var e=[];answers.forEach(function(s){var r=s.body;s.comments.forEach(function(e){OVERRIDE_REG.test(e.body)&&(r="<h1>"+e.body.replace(OVERRIDE_REG,"")+"</h1>")});var a=r.match(SCORE_REG);a&&e.push({user:getAuthorName(s),size:+a[2],language:a[1],link:s.share_link})}),e.sort(function(e,s){var r=e.size,a=s.size;return r-a});var s={},r=1,a=null,n=1;e.forEach(function(e){e.size!=a&&(n=r),a=e.size,++r;var t=jQuery("#answer-template").html();t=t.replace("{{PLACE}}",n+".").replace("{{NAME}}",e.user).replace("{{LANGUAGE}}",e.language).replace("{{SIZE}}",e.size).replace("{{LINK}}",e.link),t=jQuery(t),jQuery("#answers").append(t);var o=e.language;/<a/.test(o)&&(o=jQuery(o).text()),s[o]=s[o]||{lang:e.language,user:e.user,size:e.size,link:e.link}});var t=[];for(var o in s)s.hasOwnProperty(o)&&t.push(s[o]);t.sort(function(e,s){return e.lang>s.lang?1:e.lang<s.lang?-1:0});for(var c=0;c<t.length;++c){var i=jQuery("#language-template").html(),o=t[c];i=i.replace("{{LANGUAGE}}",o.lang).replace("{{NAME}}",o.user).replace("{{SIZE}}",o.size).replace("{{LINK}}",o.link),i=jQuery(i),jQuery("#languages").append(i)}}var ANSWER_FILTER="!t)IWYnsLAZle2tQ3KqrVveCRJfxcRLe",COMMENT_FILTER="!)Q2B_A2kjfAiU78X(md6BoYk",answers=[],answers_hash,answer_ids,answer_page=1,more_answers=!0,comment_page;getAnswers();var SCORE_REG=/<h\d>\s*([^\n,]*[^\s,]),.*?(\d+)(?=[^\n\d<>]*(?:<(?:s>[^\n<>]*<\/s>|[^\n<>]+>)[^\n\d<>]*)*<\/h\d>)/,OVERRIDE_REG=/^Override\s*header:\s*/i;

body{text-align:left!important}#answer-list,#language-list{padding:10px;width:290px;float:left}table thead{font-weight:700}table td{padding:5px}

<script src="https://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/2.1.1/jquery.min.js"></script> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="//cdn.sstatic.net/codegolf/all.css?v=83c949450c8b"> <div id="answer-list"> <h2>Leaderboard</h2> <table class="answer-list"> <thead> <tr><td></td><td>Author</td><td>Language</td><td>Size</td></tr></thead> <tbody id="answers"> </tbody> </table> </div><div id="language-list"> <h2>Winners by Language</h2> <table class="language-list"> <thead> <tr><td>Language</td><td>User</td><td>Score</td></tr></thead> <tbody id="languages"> </tbody> </table> </div><table style="display: none"> <tbody id="answer-template"> <tr><td>{{PLACE}}</td><td>{{NAME}}</td><td>{{LANGUAGE}}</td><td>{{SIZE}}</td><td><a href="{{LINK}}">Link</a></td></tr></tbody> </table> <table style="display: none"> <tbody id="language-template"> <tr><td>{{LANGUAGE}}</td><td>{{NAME}}</td><td>{{SIZE}}</td><td><a href="{{LINK}}">Link</a></td></tr></tbody> </table>

Answer 1

Vim, 39, 34 keystrokes

:se ri
Y:s/./<C-r>"/g
<C-o>qqgJC<C-r>"<esc>gJ@qq@q

5 bytes saved thanks to @Lynn!

Here is a gif of it happening live: (Note that this gif is of a previous version since I haven't had time to re-record it yet).

And here is an explanation of how it works:

:se ri                  "Turn 'reverse indent' on.
Y                       "Yank this line
:s/./<C-r>"/g           "Replace every character on this line with the register
                        "We just yanked followed by a newline
<C-o>                   "Jump to our previous location
     qq                 "Start recording in register 'q'
       gJ               "Join these two lines
         C              "Delete this line, and enter insert mode
          <C-r>"<esc>   "Paste the line we just deleted backwards 
gJ                      "Join these two lines
  @q                    "Call macro 'q'. This will run until we hit the bottom of the buffer.
    q                   "Stop recording.
     @q                 "Start our recursive macro

On a side note, Y grabs an extra newline, which is usually an obnoxious feature. This is probably the first ever time that it has actually saved several bytes!

Answer 2

Python, 40 bytes

f=lambda s,i=0:s[i:]and s+f(s[::-1],i+1)

A recursive function. Prepends the input string s to the function of the reverse until the counter i exceed the length of s.

Answer 3

Brain-Flak, 418 378 228 bytes

This is my Brain-Flak masterpiece. It may not be well golfed but the challenge is the most difficult I have ever encountered.

Try it online!

(([])[()]){({}[()]<(({}(<()>))<{({}[()]<(({}()<(({}<>))>)<({()<({}[()]<({}<({}<>)<>>)>)>}{}<>){({}[()]<({}<>)<>>)}{}>)>)}{}{}<>([]){{}({}<>)<>([])}{}<>>)>)}{}([(({}))]{({})({}[()])}{}){(({}[({}<>)<>])<<>({}<><{(({}[()])<{({}[()]<({}<({}<>)<>>)>)}{}<>([]){{}({}<>)<>([])}{}<>>)}{}>)>)}

Explanation

This explanation is now a bit outdated but it still does a pretty good job of explaining the program.

This explanation is going to go a little different from my regular explanation process. I am going to explain how I came about this result rather than explain the result in order. Here it goes:

Roller

After working at the problem a quite a bit I came up with this code:

(n[()])({()<({}[()]<({}<({}<>)<>>)>)>}{}<>){({}[()]<({}<>)<>>)}{}<>

This code (where n is the literal for some number. e.g. ()()) will take the item on the top of the stack and move it down n steps. With n as the stack height this will perform a stack "roll". i.e. move the top item to the bottom of the stack. Here's how it works:

We put the place we want to move the item to minus one on the stack. Why minus one? I don't know it just works that way.

(n[()])

We then loop until this number reaches zero keeping track of the loop with a ().

{()<({}[()]<...>)>)>}{}

Each time we loop we pick up the top item and move the item underneath it to the other stack. This puts the number on top in its place.

({}<({}<>)<>>)

All we need to do now is put the numbers we moved back. We switch to the off stack and push the number of runs the loop made.

(...<>)

We loop decrementing the newly pushed number until it reaches zero. Each time we move one number back.

{({}[()]<({}<>)<>>)}{}<>

Reverse

I next modified the roll to make a full stack reverse:

(n){(({}[()])<{({}[()]<({}<({}<>)<>>)>)}{}<>([]){{}({}<>)<>([])}{}<>>)}{}

Once again n represents the depth of the reverse. That is the top n items on the stack will be reversed. How it works:

The reverse is just a fancily wrapped roller. We simply roll the top of the stack n times decrementing the depth of the roll by one each time.

(n){(({}[()])<ROLLER>)}{}

Duplicate

In place duplication is hard. Really hard. After I figured out how to reverse the stack it still took a great deal of effort to come up with the duplication algorithm.

Here it is:

(((n)<{({}[()]<(({}<>))<>>)}{}<>>)<{({}[()]<({}<>)<>([][()])({()<({}[()]<({}<({}<>)<>>)>)>}{}<>){({}[()]<({}<>)<>>)}{}<>>)}{}<>([]){{}({}<>)<>([])}{}<>([]){(({}[()])<{({}[()]<({}<({}<>)<>>)>)}{}<>([]){{}({}<>)<>([])}{}<>>)}{}>)

Its a bit of a big one but here's how it works:

Start by pushing n. n is the depth of the duplicate. We also open two parentheses. These allow us to store the value of the n in the scope until its needed again.

(((n)<

Next we loop n times each time pushing the top value of the stack to the off stack twice. This makes the initial duplicates for each number on the stack.

{({}[()]<(({}<>))<>>)}{}

Now we have two copies of each number on the offstack. We need to separate these into two groups.

So we switch to the offstack and recall one of the ns we saved at the beginning.

<>>)

We loop n times.

{({}[()]<...>)}{}

Each time we move one copy to the mainstack.

({}<>)<>

And roll one copy to the bottom of the stack. (This assumes the offstack was empty to begin with making this duplicate not stack clean)

([][()])ROLLER

Once that is done we have split the original into two groups the "original" and a copy on the offstack (the copy is actually in reverse). So we just move the copy to the main stack and we can be done with it.

([]){{}({}<>)<>([])}{}<>

Skeleton program

Now that I have made all of the pieces of the program, I just have to insert them into a frame.

The frame doubles the text one less than the stack's height times Using duplicate.

(([])[()])
{
 ({}[()]<
  DUPLICATE 
 >)
>)}{}

And then reverses the stack in decreasing increments of the initial stack height from n^2-n to 0.

(({}))
{
 (({}[()])<
  ({}<>)<>(({}))({<({}[()])><>({})<>}{})<>{}<>
  ({}<({}<>)<>>)<>({}<>)
  ({}<
   REVERSE
  >)
 >)
}{}{}

Answer 4

Jelly, 4 3 bytes

,Ṛṁ

Try it online! or Verify all test cases.

Saved a byte thanks to @Maltysen.

Explanation

,Ṛṁ  Input: string S
 Ṛ    Reverse S
,     Join S with reverse of S. Makes a list [S, rev(S)]
  ṁ   Mold [S, rev(S)] to len(S) by repeating elements cyclically
      Return and print implicitly as a string

Answer 5

PHP, 54 52 bytes

(49 bytes, but do not work if string contains '0')

for(;($a=$argv[1])[$i++];)echo$i%2?$a:strrev($a);

(52 bytes)

<?=str_pad('',strlen($a=$argv[1])**2,$a.strrev($a));

(54 bytes)

for(;$i++<strlen($a=$argv[1]);)echo$i%2?$a:strrev($a);

Answer 6

2sable, 3 bytes

Code:

gGÂ

Explanation:

g   # Get the length of the input
 G  # Do the following n - 1 times:
  Â # Bifurcate, which duplicates a and reverses the duplicate

Uses the CP-1252 encoding. Try it online!

Answer 7

J, 13 8 bytes

Saved 5 bytes thanks to miles!

#;@$];|.

This is a 5-train with the following verbs:

# ;@$ ] ; |.

The inner fork is composed of ] (identity), ; (link), and |. (reverse). Observe:

   (| ; |.) 'Hello!'
+------+------+
|Hello!|!olleH|
+------+------+

The outer two verbs make the rest of the train. # is, in this case, the size of the argument, that is, the length. The verb linking these is ;@$, or ravel over reshape. Observe:

   # 'Hello!'
6
   6 $ (] ; |.) 'Hello!'
+------+------+------+------+------+------+
|Hello!|!olleH|Hello!|!olleH|Hello!|!olleH|
+------+------+------+------+------+------+
   ; 6 $ (] ; |.) 'Hello!'
Hello!!olleHHello!!olleHHello!!olleH
   6 ;@$ (] ; |.) 'Hello!'
Hello!!olleHHello!!olleHHello!!olleH
   (# ;@$ (] ; |.)) 'Hello!'
Hello!!olleHHello!!olleHHello!!olleH
   (# ;@$ ] ; |.) 'Hello!'
Hello!!olleHHello!!olleHHello!!olleH
   (#;@$];|.) 'Hello!'
Hello!!olleHHello!!olleHHello!!olleH

---

Old solution.

[:,|.^:(i.@#)

Simple enough. |. is reverse, and ^: is power conjunction, which repeats it's left verb (right hand) # of times. When the right argument is a verb, that verb is called on the argument. The right verb in this case is range from zero (i.) to the length (#). When raised to an array, the intermediate results are kept. All that needs to be done is to flatten the array with ,.

Intermediate results

   (i.@#) 'Hello!'
0 1 2 3 4 5
   |.^:0 1 2 3 4 5 'Hello!'
Hello!
!olleH
Hello!
!olleH
Hello!
!olleH
   |.^:(i.@#) 'Hello!'
Hello!
!olleH
Hello!
!olleH
Hello!
!olleH
   ([:,|.^:(i.@#)) 'Hello!'
Hello!!olleHHello!!olleHHello!!olleH

Answer 8

Ruby, 39 bytes

->(s){s.reverse!.gsub(/./){s.reverse!}}

I suck at Ruby. Golfing help is appreciated.

Ruby is a really nice language for this because of .reverse!

Explanation

I was hoping it would be someting simple like:

s.gsub(/./){s.reverse!}

but because of boilerplate/challenge restriction it's longer.

What s.reverse! is very useful. s.reverse! is basically s = s.reverse!, meaning it also mutates s.

---

What each section of the program does is described below:

->(s){             # Lambda with argument s
      s.reverse!   # Reverse `s` see above for details
      .gsub(/./)   # Replace every character with...
      {s.reverse!} # the input reversed!

The thing about s.reverse! that is great is that everytime it is evaluated the string get's flipped. So as it replaces the string. s is modified!

Answer 9

Perl, 24 bytes

Includes +2 for -lp

Give input on STDIN:

rev.pl <<< Hello!

rev.pl:

#!/usr/bin/perl -lp
s%.%s/.?/chop/eg;$`%eg

Surprisingly this does not use the builtin reverse operator. That name is just soooo long, all solutions I could think of with reverse are at least 1 byte longer.

Answer 10

JavaScript (ES 6), 59 50 bytes

9 Bytes thanks to Hedi and Huntro.

f=(s,n=1)=>s[n]?s+f([...s].reverse().join``,n+1):s

recursive function.

Reversing the string takes almost half of the size (25 22 bytes!) ...
Why isn´t there a native way for that?

Answer 11

Minkolang, 17 bytes:

$oId$z$Dz[rz[O]].

Try it here!

Explanation

$o                   Read in whole input as characters
  Id                 Push the length of stack and duplicate
    $z               Pop top of stack and store in register (z)
      $D             Pop top of stack (n) and duplicate whole stack n-1 times
        z[     ]     z times, do the following:
          r          Reverse the stack
           z[O]      z times, pop the top of stack and output as character
                .    Stop.

Answer 12

Pip, 11 10 bytes

L#aORVRV:a

Try it online!

Explanation:

            a is first cmdline argument (implicit)
L#a         Loop len(a) times:
      RV:a   Reverse a and assign back to a
   ORV       Output the reverse of a (since it needs to go forward first then backward)

Answer 13

Haskell, 40 36 32 Bytes

m s=take(length s^2)$cycle$s++reverse s

Example:

*Main> m "Hello!"
"Hello!!olleHHello!!olleHHello!!olleH"

Even shorter (credit to Damien):

q s=zip(s>>[s,reverse s])s>>=fst

s>>[s,reverse s] cycles ["abc","cba",...] which is zipped to correct size and concatMap'ped with fst

Answer 14

MATL, 13 12 8 bytes

Pushes all elements, combines in the end.

td"tP]&h

td"  ]     %For loop over string length - 1 due to diff
   tP      %Push copy of string, reverse
      &h   %Concatenate entire stack horizontally
        

Try it online!

---

Old versions:

Completely different approach, based on fprintf:

t"t1$0#YDP]x

t"        ]   % For loop over string
  t           % Duplicate string for printing:
   1$0#YD     % `fprintf` with 1 input, 0 output (i.e., to screen).
         P    % Reverse
           x  % Empty stack to prevent implicit output

---

Version based on reversing a template string

ttd"wPtbYc]Dx

t                 %Duplicate input, to create 'accumulator' string 
                  % (alongside the input string which will serve as 'template'
 td               %Duplicate input, diff to get an stringof size input-1
   "       ]      %For loop over size n-1 string (consumes diff'd string)
     wP           %Get 'template' string on top of stack, and reverse
       tb         %Duplicate template string, and switch with 'accumulator' string
         Yc       %Concatenate template string with accumulator. 
            Dx   %Display top element, delete template string to prevent implicit disp

Answer 15

8088 Assembly, IBM PC DOS, 29 28 bytes

Assembled, xxd dump:

00000000: d1ee ac48 938a cbfc 518a cbf7 da78 01fd  ...H....Q....x..
00000010: acac b40e cd10 e2f9 59e2 ecc3            ........Y...

Unassembled listing:

D1 EE       SHR  SI, 1          ; point SI to DOS PSP (080H) 
AC          LODSB               ; load input string length into AL 
48          DEC  AX             ; remove leading space from length counter 
93          XCHG BX, AX         ; save input length to BL 
8A FB       MOV  BH, BL         ; string output counter in BH 
        S_LOOP: 
FC          CLD                 ; set direction forward 
8A CB       MOV  CL, BL         ; reset char counter in CL 
F7 DA       NEG  DX             ; flip DX to toggle fwd/back output 
78 01       JS   C_START        ; if positive, go forward 
FD          STD                 ; otherwise go backwards 
        C_START: 
AC          LODSB               ; adjust SI to first/last char
        C_LOOP: 
AC          LODSB               ; load next char into AL
B4 0E       MOV  AH, 0EH        ; PC BIOS tty output function
CD 10       INT  10H            ; write char to console
E2 F9       LOOP C_LOOP         ; continue looping through chars
FE CF       DEC  BH             ; decrement string count loop
75 EC       JNZ  S_LOOP         ; if not zero, continue loop
C3          RET                 ; exit to DOS

Standalone PC DOS executable program. Input string via command line, output is console.

Answer 16

Perl 6,  31  30 bytes

{[~] (|($_,.flip)xx*)[^.chars]}

Save one byte by misusing .ords, which returns a list of ordinals, then implicitly turn that into a number to create a range with.

{[~] (|($_,.flip)xx*)[^.ords]}

Explanation:

# bare block lambda with implicit parameter ｢$_｣
{
  # reduce using string concatenation operator ｢~｣
  [~]

  (
    # create a Slip
    |(
      # of the input, and its string reverse
      $_, .flip

    # list repeated infinitely
    ) xx *

  # get the values in the range from 0 up-to and excluding
  # the number of characters ｢0 ..^ +$_.ords｣
  )[ ^.ords ]
}

Usage:

my &code = {[~] (|($_,.flip)xx*)[^.ords]}

say code 'a'; # a
say code 'abcd'; # abcddcbaabcddcba
say code 'OK!'; # OK!!KOOK!
say code 4815162342; # 4815162342243261518448151623422432615184481516234224326151844815162342243261518448151623422432615184

Answer 17

Vim + coreutils, 32 keystrokes

You can never have too many Vim answers.

qqYv:!rev
Pjq@=len(@")
@q2dkv{gJ

Explanation

qq               " Start recording macro
Y                " Yank (copy) line
v:!rev<CR>       " Reverse line with coreutils rev command
Pj               " Paste yanked line above this line
q                " Stop recording
@=len(@")<CR>@q  " Playback macro once for each character
2dk              " Delete last 3 lines
v{gJ             " Join lines

Answer 18

Scala, 73 72 71 bytes

def f(s:String)=for(i<-1 to s.length){print(if(i%2>0)s else s.reverse)}

This is my first attempt at code golfing, so I'm sure there are countless improvements.

Update:

Golfed away 1 byte by removing brackets.

Thanks to Destructible Watermelon for suggestion, shaved off a byte.

Answer 19

PowerShell v2+, 57 bytes

param($a)-join(1..($x=$a.length)|%{($a[$x..0],$a)[$_%2]})

No real clean way to get string lengths or reverse 'em, so this is pretty lengthy.

Takes input $a, loops from 1 to $a.length (stored in $x for use later). Each iteration we use a pseudo-ternary to index into an array of either $a or $a[$x..0] (i.e., reversed), based on whether our input number is odd/even [$_%2]. These are all encapsulated in parens and -joined together to form a single string. That's left on the pipeline, and output is implicit.

PS C:\Tools\Scripts\golfing> .\stringgnirts.ps1 'TimmyD'
TimmyDDymmiTTimmyDDymmiTTimmyDDymmiT

Answer 20

Dyalog APL, 8 bytes

∊≢⍴⊂,⊂∘⌽

∊ flatten

≢ the tally

⍴ cyclically reshaping

⊂ the enclosed argument

, followed by

⊂∘⌽ the enclosed reversed argument

TryAPL online!

-1 byte thanks to jimmy23013.

Answer 21

Cubix, 52 bytes

Ap\:\;.#u/\:qqsoq(?;u.q..$u<../pB@u:\.....\(?q..s..p

On a cube:

      A p \
      : \ ;
      . # u
/ \ : q q s o q ( ? ; u
. q . . $ u < . . / p B
@ u : \ . . . . . \ ( ?
      q . .
      s . .
      p . .

This one was fun; there are bytes still to be golfed out of this but this will definitely work.

Try it online!

explanation:

Input of ABC

• /A : go north and read in all inputs as characters; -1 will be at the bottom
• p\;. : remove the -1 from the stack
• u# : push the string length (number of items on the stack)
• \:\:qq : dup the string length twice, push two copies to bottom of stack

• loop:

  • soq(?/<u : swap top of stack, ouptut top of stack as ASCII, push top (letter) to bottom, decrement top of stack, turn right if not done, then move IP to the right place.
  • at end of loop, the stack will look like C B A 3 3 0

• ;u : pop top of stack C B A 3 3

• B : reverse stack 3 3 A B C
• p( : move bottom to top and decrement 3 A B C 2
• ? if top is zero, go straight to @ and terminate
• else
  • psq:uq : move bottom to top, swap top and move top to bottom dup, and move top to bottom 3 2 A B C 3
  • $u : skip u
  • < puts us back into the loop.

Interpreter

Answer 22

C (gcc), 88 87 85 83 68 66 83 82 78 bytes

-1 thanks to ceilingcat

Old version

p,q;f(char*s){p=q=1;for(char*m=s--;*m;s[p+=q]*p?:(m++,p+=q=-q))putchar(s[p]);}

Try it online!

Shorter version (slightly broken)

Riffing on the 76 byte approach by ASCII-only in the comments, and -1 byte from his tweak of my tweak.

Edit: This version is slightly broken in that it assumes that every string is preceded by a NULL byte, which is not always true. (See last test case in link). Reverting to the 83 byte version for now.

f(char*s){for(char*n=s-1,k=1;*s++;k=-k)for(;*(n+=k);)putchar(*n);}

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Answer 23

brainfuck, 71 49 43 bytes

,[>+[>+<-],]>[<<[<]>[.>]>-[<<[.<]>[>]>-<]>]

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Thanks to Jo King for saving 6 bytes.

[Tape: [Letters], 0, counter]
,[          while input
  >+        increment old counter
  [>+<-]    move counter to next position
  ,         input next
]
>[          while counter
  <<[<]>    go to first letter
  [.>]      print word forwards
  >-        decrement counter
  [         if counter
    <<      go to last letter
    [.<]    print word backwards
    >[>]>-  decrement counter
    <       exit if
  ]
  >         go to counter
]

Answer 24

Java, 127 111 88 bytes

(s,r)->{for(int i=0;i++<s.length();)r+=i%2<1?new StringBuffer(s).reverse():s;return r;};

Ungolfed test program

    public static void main(String[] args) {
    BiFunction<String, String, String> func = (s, r) -> {
        for (int i = 0; i++ < s.length();) {
            r += i % 2 < 1 ? new StringBuffer(s).reverse() : s;
        }
        return r;
    };
    System.out.println(func.apply("Hello!", ""));
}

Answer 25

R, 53 bytes

Assumes that the input is space- or newline-separated for each character.

cat(rep(c(i<-scan(,""),rev(i)),l=length(i)^2),sep="")

Some test cases:

> cat(rep(c(i<-scan(,""),rev(i)),len=length(i)^2),sep="")
1: h e l l o !
7: 
Read 6 items
hello!!ollehhello!!ollehhello!!olleh

> cat(rep(c(i<-scan(,""),rev(i)),l=length(i)^2),sep="")
1: a
2: 
Read 1 item
a

> cat(rep(c(i<-scan(,""),rev(i)),l=length(i)^2),sep="")
1: a b c d
5: 
Read 4 items
abcddcbaabcddcba

> cat(rep(c(i<-scan(,""),rev(i)),l=length(i)^2),sep="")
1: O K !
4: 
Read 3 items
OK!!KOOK!

> cat(rep(c(i<-scan(,""),rev(i)),l=length(i)^2),sep="")
1: 4 8 1 5 1 6 2 3 4 2
11: 
Read 10 items
4815162342243261518448151623422432615184481516234224326151844815162342243261518448151623422432615184

> cat(rep(c(i<-scan(,""),rev(i)),l=length(i)^2),sep="")
1: P P C G
5:    
Read 4 items
PPCGGCPPPPCGGCPP

> cat(rep(c(i<-scan(,""),rev(i)),l=length(i)^2),sep="")
1: 4 2
3: 
Read 2 items
4224

Answer 26

Java, 151 bytes

public static void r(String s){String t = new StringBuffer(s).reverse().toString();for(int i=0;i<s.length();i++){System.out.print(((i%2==1)?t:s));}}

}

Ungolfed:

public static void r(String s) {
    String t = new StringBuffer(s).reverse().toString();
    for(int i = 0; i < s.length();i++) {
        System.out.print(((i % 2 == 1) ? t : s));
    }
}

Answer 27

C#, 94 bytes

using System.Linq;string R(string n)=>string.Concat(n.SelectMany((c,i)=>1>i%2?n:n.Reverse()));

76 bytes for the method + 18 bytes for LINQ import.

How it works:

using System.Linq; // Required for LINQ extension methods.

string R(string n) => 
    string.Concat( // Concatenate the following chars into a single string
        n.SelectMany( // Enumerate each char in n, flattening the returned IEnumerable<char>'s into a single IEnumerable<char>
            /*IEnumerable<char> Lambda*/(/*char*/ c, /*int*/ i) => // i = index in n
                1 > i % 2 // Check if i is even or odd
                    ? n // if i is even, add n to the concat
                    : n.Reverse() // else reverse n and concat that
        )
    )
;

Answer 28

Julia, 42 bytes

h(s,l=1)=l==endof(s)?s:s*h(reverse(s),l+1)

Recursive function with counter variable l. If it is equal to the length of the string s, simply return it, otherwise concatenate (s*...) it with h(reverse(s),...) while incrementing the counter l+1.

Answer 29

CJam, 10 bytes

l_,({_W%}*

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Explanation

l            e# Read line
 _           e# Duplicate
  ,(         e# Length minus 1
    {   }*   e# Run code block that many times
     _       e# Duplicate
      W%     e# Reverse
             e# Implicitly display

Answer 30

Octave, 39 35 bytes

@(x)[x'+~x;flip(x'+~x),''](1:end/2)

f('Hello!')
ans = Hello!!olleHHello!!olleHHello!!olleH

Explanation:

@(x)            % Take x as input, inside apostrophes 'Hello!'
x'+~x           % Create a mesh of the ASCII-code of the input letters
                % For input `bcd` this will be:
                %    98    98    98
                %    99    99    99
                %   100   100   100
;flip(x'+~x)   % Concatenate vertically to create:
                %    98    98    98
                %    99    99    99
                %   100   100   100
                %   100   100   100
                %    99    99    99
                %    98    98    98
___,'']         % Short cut to convert ASCII-code to characters
(1:end/2)       % Display the first half of this array of letters, as a
                % horizontal string

Saved 4 bytes thanks to Luis. ~x instead of 0*x saved one byte (works because all elements of x are non-zero. flip instead of flipud saved another two bytes (I didn't know flip existed).