From: Charlie Bowman <charlie@...>
Date: 2006-04-07T22:53:16+09:00
Subject: Re: [QUIZ] Markov Chains (#74)

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I'm pumped! I've been reading this mailing list for the last 3 months
and I finally feel ready to try out a quiz.  This one sounds fun!

On Fri, 2006-04-07 at 22:02 +0900, Ruby Quiz wrote:

> The three rules of Ruby Quiz:
> 
> 1.  Please do not post any solutions or spoiler discussion for this quiz until
> 48 hours have passed from the time on this message.
> 
> 2.  Support Ruby Quiz by submitting ideas as often as you can:
> 
> http://www.rubyquiz.com/
> 
> 3.  Enjoy!
> 
> Suggestion:  A [QUIZ] in the subject of emails about the problem helps everyone
> on Ruby Talk follow the discussion.
> 
> -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
> 
> This week's Ruby Quiz is about text generation.  That's right, we're going to
> teach your computer to weave tall tales.
> 
> At its most basic level, a solution might be:
> 
> 	>> (1..30).map { (("a".."z").to_a + [" "] * 10)[rand(36)] }.join
> 	=> "fb mcr hhluesjbhtf swm eehokmi"
> 
> However, let's make our goal to get as close to English looking sentences as
> possible.  One way you might do this is using a technique called Markov Chains.
> 
> To use Markov Chains, you read some text document(s), making note of which
> characters commonly follow which characters or which words commonly follow other
> words (it works for either scale).  Then, when generating text, you just select
> a character or word to output, based on the characters or words that came before
> it.
> 
> The number of previous characters or words considered is called the "order" and
> you can adjust that to try and find a natural feel.  For example, here is some
> generated text using a second order word chain derived from the Sherlock Holmes
> novel "The Hound of the Baskervilles" by Arthur Conan Doyle:
> 
> 	The stars shone cold and bright, while a crushing weight of responsibility
> 	from my shoulders. Suddenly my thoughts with sadness. Then on the lady's
> 	face. "What can I assist you?"
> 
> If you need text's to prime your program with, I suggest searching Project
> Gutenberg:
> 
> 	http://www.gutenberg.org/
> 




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