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Questions tagged [metagolf]

Metagolf is golfing the output of a metaprogram. A metaprogram produces a program which solves a given task, and the length of that output determines the score of the original program.

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13 votes
7 answers
2k views

Auto-golf an esolang

The lack of a social life drove a poor nerd into inventing another superfluous esolang called !+~%. For no good reason it initializes the accumulator with ...
Philippos's user avatar
  • 2,660
18 votes
24 answers
3k views

Meta-cat program

Write a program or function that takes input and outputs/returns a full program (in the same language) that outputs said input. Note that the input may contain any printable ASCII character or newline ...
Dadsdy's user avatar
  • 2,095
12 votes
3 answers
489 views

><> numbers metagolf

I struggle to easily encode big numbers in ><>. If only there was a program that could find the best way for me? What is ><> ...
mousetail 'he-him''s user avatar
5 votes
1 answer
192 views

BitCycle Metagolf

Background BitCycle is a two-dimensional Turing-complete programming language involves moving bits around a playfield. Because I am too lazy to write BitCycle programs myself, you will be writing a ...
Aiden Chow's user avatar
  • 14.2k
13 votes
7 answers
562 views

Splinter metagolf

The language Splinter is an esoteric programming language where data is stored in 'splinters'. There are three different types of syntax: Simple character output: ...
emanresu A's user avatar
  • 44.2k
7 votes
2 answers
427 views

Gelatin integer metagolf

Gelatin is a worse version of Jelly. It is a tacit programming language that always takes a single integer argument and that has 7 (or maybe 16) commands. Gelatin Gelatin programs will always match ...
caird coinheringaahin g's user avatar
20 votes
6 answers
2k views

The 1+ Metagolf Challenge

I'm letting this one out of the sandbox. Hopefully it is well-written and make sense, feel free to improve. So in order to make 1+ more popular (and ease the creation of golfed 1+ text-printing ...
TwilightSparkle's user avatar
12 votes
3 answers
844 views

Metagolf the OEIS

We've had Meta Regex Golf and Display OEIS Sequences. Now, it is time for Meta OEIS Golf. Challenge Given a sequence of integers, your program/function should output a program/function in the same ...
fireflame241's user avatar
  • 16.3k
7 votes
4 answers
447 views

Program ordinals and omega squared

A program ordinal is a (possibly transfinite) ordinal which can be assigned to programs in some language depending on their output. To be more specific: Strings that give no output have ordinal 0 ...
AndrewTheCodegolfer's user avatar
16 votes
6 answers
915 views

Reverse busy beaver problem

In this challenge, Turing machines operate on a zero-initialized binary tape that is infinite in both directions. You are given an integer \$N\$, where \$1 \le N \le 20000\$. Your program has to ...
the default.'s user avatar
  • 8,445
24 votes
19 answers
25k views

99 ways to say "I love you"

Inspired by this blog post. Write a program that outputs 99 distinct programs (in the same language) that output the string I love you. How the programs are ...
Mason's user avatar
  • 2,165
12 votes
1 answer
398 views

Self-displaying image [closed]

Background There are self-extracting .ZIP files. Typically they have the extension .EXE (and by executing the file they will be ...
Martin Rosenau's user avatar
11 votes
11 answers
1k views

N times program for the N-th number

Given an array of positive integers A as the input, generate a program that, when repeated for k times, output the ...
l4m2's user avatar
  • 28.3k
13 votes
6 answers
1k views

Text to Brain-Flak

Your challenge is to turn input text to brain-flak code that will output the text. Tutorial taken from here with permission here Brain-Flak has two stacks, known as 'left' and 'right'. The active ...
user avatar
17 votes
1 answer
2k views

Google's Hopping Bunny

On December 4, 2017, the Google Doodle was a graphical programming game featuring a bunny. The later levels were nicely non-trivial and they seemed like a great candidate for an atomic-golf challenge. ...
El'endia Starman's user avatar
18 votes
1 answer
293 views

Brainflak Multiplication Metagolf

This question is the first of several Brain-flak Birthday challenges designed to celebrate Brain-Flak's first Birthday! You can find more information about Brain-Flak's Birthday here Last summer we ...
Wheat Wizard's user avatar
  • 100k
19 votes
3 answers
811 views

Meta radiation hardener

Background On this site, we occasionally have questions requiring programs to be "radiation hardened"; this means that the program has to be able to survive the deletion of one or more bytes, no ...
user avatar
2 votes
7 answers
963 views

Kolmogorov Complexity Meta Golfer

Mike Bufardeci (Pyth) - 175 bytes Leo (Retina) - 175 bytes devRicher (Lua) - 182 bytes Peter Taylor (CJam) - Waiting for clarification Lyth (C++11) - Waiting for clarification Edit: Several ...
Julian Lachniet's user avatar
13 votes
3 answers
884 views

Combinatory Conundrum!

Introduction: Combinatory Logic Combinatory logic (CL) is based off of things called combinators, which are basically functions. There are two basic "built-in" combinators, ...
clismique's user avatar
  • 6,990
12 votes
1 answer
305 views

Maths Metagolf Mania!

Mathemania Specs: Every piece of Mathemania code starts off with the number 2. From the 2, you can do the following operations: ...
clismique's user avatar
  • 6,990
44 votes
10 answers
4k views

There can be only 1!

Your task is, given a positive integer n, to generate an expression that equals the number n. The catch is: you're only allowed ...
clismique's user avatar
  • 6,990
31 votes
9 answers
2k views

Golf a Brain-Flak Integer

Integers are tedious to represent in Brain-Flak. There are 8 operators: ...
Neil's user avatar
  • 177k
3 votes
3 answers
2k views

Do not repeat yourself

Inspired by this challenge Given a number m, output a program that prints out the string Do not repeat yourself. Now for the ...
Riker's user avatar
  • 7,850
20 votes
5 answers
1k views

Shortest simple regex matching a binary word

Task Define a simple regex as a non-empty regular expression consisting only of characters 0 and 1, grouping parentheses ...
lynn's user avatar
  • 69.2k
17 votes
4 answers
955 views

Actually Integer Metagolf

Background Actually (the successor to Seriously) is a stack-based imperative golfing language I created in November of 2015. Like many other golfing languages, it has one-byte commands that perform ...
user avatar
27 votes
1 answer
1k views

Auto BATCH golfer

I love BATCH, despite its shocking lack of functional commands, despite even due to its lack of non-integer support. Why? Because this works: SET var=SET %var% i=0 ...
Conor O'Brien's user avatar
6 votes
2 answers
496 views

Create the shortest BitShift

Introduction BitShift is an esolang, created by me, to output strings. Sounds boring, is boring. However, the only instructions available to BitShift are 0 and <...
Bassdrop Cumberwubwubwub's user avatar
25 votes
4 answers
721 views

Starry Metagolf

Starry is a funny esoteric programming language in which code consists only of +*.,`' where the actual command represented by each of those characters is determined ...
Martin Ender's user avatar
34 votes
1 answer
791 views

Program the Cup-Stacking Robot

I'm sure everyone has seen before that cups can be stacked into pyramids (and other shapes): A A A A A A A A A A A A A A A A A ...
Martin Ender's user avatar
22 votes
7 answers
845 views

Outputting a base-proof expression

Background In some possible futures, the world will convert their numerical systems from decimal (base 10 or b10) to some other base (binary ...
ETHproductions's user avatar
24 votes
4 answers
2k views

Golfing strings in Fourier

Challenge Given a string as input, golf down the Fourier program which outputs that string. In Fourier there is no easy way to output a string: you have to go through each character code and output ...
Beta Decay's user avatar
  • 23.4k
24 votes
5 answers
682 views

StickStack Numbers

StickStack is a very simple stack-based programming language with only two instructions: | pushes the length of the stack onto the stack ...
randomra's user avatar
  • 20.9k
11 votes
3 answers
838 views

Randomized Brainfuck Compiler

Joe is your average BF developer. He is about to check in his code changes to their repository when he gets a call from his boss. "Joe! The new client's machine is broken! The brainfuck interpreter ...
Maltysen's user avatar
  • 25.8k
7 votes
1 answer
324 views

Help My Brother Work on his Tan(gent)!

This challenge is entirely fictional. There is no time limit for this challenge. My little brother is terrible with computers! He saved up all of his money to buy a new one, and within half an hour ...
BrainSteel's user avatar
  • 5,490
16 votes
5 answers
2k views

Express all 16 boolean functions with the less than operator

There are 16 distinct boolean functions for two binary variables, A and B: ...
Calvin's Hobbies's user avatar
11 votes
4 answers
1k views

Encoding an URL in brainfuck

Inspired by this question, your goal today is to encode an URL in brainfuck. My browser has been hacked! The location bar has been turned into a brainfuck interpreter. I need a program that turns an ...
orlp's user avatar
  • 39.2k
11 votes
8 answers
1k views

Generate a Brainf_ck program that outputs a string of given length

Your friend is trying to break into a vault that has a peculiar locking system: it requires a certain number of gentle knocks in a particular spot. Your friend discovered the number (which is in the ...
anatolyg's user avatar
  • 13.9k
11 votes
3 answers
472 views

Golfing every ASCII character in 99

99 is a programming language I invented earlier this week for my challenge Write an interpreter for 99. (Invented but never needed to implement thanks to half a dozen of you. ;) ) The full language ...
Calvin's Hobbies's user avatar
16 votes
1 answer
1k views

Write a Kolmogorov Complexity Solver

The Kolmogorov complexity of a string S is the length of the shortest program P, written in some programming language L, whose output is exactly S. (Yes, the real definition is more formal but this ...
Calvin's Hobbies's user avatar
19 votes
1 answer
1k views

Translate Prelude to Befunge

This is Weekly Challenge #2. Theme: Translation Write a program or function that takes in source code for a program in Prelude and outputs code for an equivalent program in Befunge-93. For the ...
feersum's user avatar
  • 31.5k
13 votes
3 answers
864 views

Auto-meta-code-golf

You are sick of all of the codegolf challenges. Hence you decide to write a program that will automatically golf some Python code for you. There are 3 test cases: ...
Nathan Merrill's user avatar
19 votes
2 answers
632 views

Compressing boolean formulae

Syntax ~ not /\ and \/ or t true ...
lily's user avatar
  • 358
17 votes
9 answers
3k views

Write a brainfuck translator

In any programming or scripting language x, write a program that takes a valid brainfuck sourcecode from stdin and output, to stdout, the sourcecode of a program, written in language x, that would ...
user12205's user avatar
  • 9,018
6 votes
3 answers
182 views

Count digits in a string, check if there its a fibonnaci number [duplicate]

There's a question with a comment with some code thats far too long. For a site that has counting fetish, this code just seems so wrong. Solve this meta-riddle, and explain it with a rhyme. Winner is ...
user avatar
29 votes
9 answers
2k views

Anti-golfscript anti-golf: create a task where GolfScript or J is outgolfed by your (conventional) lang [closed]

You need to make three things: Statement of a task, T. Solution of the task in language not typically used for golfing, A. Solution of the task in language typically used for golfing, B. Don't try to ...
Vi.'s user avatar
  • 2,697
33 votes
4 answers
6k views

Meta regex golf

In the spirit of this xkcd Write a program that plays regex golf with arbitrary pairs of lists. The program should at least attempt to make the regex short, a program that just outputs ...
Manishearth's user avatar
7 votes
7 answers
496 views

Write a program to compose a quine of a specified length

Write a program, in a language of your choice, that will compose a quine program of a requested size. The generated program may be in the same or a different language, if desired. Programs are scored ...
AJMansfield's user avatar
  • 2,888
13 votes
10 answers
3k views

Encode a program with the fewest distinct characters possible

The goal is to write a program that encodes an other program (input) with the fewest character possible. Scoring The score is equal to the different number of characters needed for the output. Lower ...
Johannes Kuhn's user avatar
35 votes
11 answers
16k views

Brainf*** Golfer

One of easiest code written by a programming language is a program printing sequence of characters (ex. "Hello, world!"). However, some esoteric programming languages like Brainfuck, even this ...
JiminP's user avatar
  • 3,462
7 votes
1 answer
598 views

Set the chessboard

Objective Given an arbitrary chessboard as standard input (in which each piece is on a square), produce as standard output a list of moves needed to regularize, or set up, the chessboard. The moves ...
PleaseStand's user avatar
  • 5,607