Resolving Boolean Expression

[Vj Kamath]

Given this input, i have to write a program to generate different possible combinations.
( ( ( A | B | C | D | F | G | E | H | I ) & J ) | ( ( A | D | H ) & L ) | ( ( B | G ) & M ) | ( F & K ) )

result should be
AJ OR BJ OR CJ OR DJ OR EJ OR FJ OR HJ OR IJ
OR
AL OR DL OR HL
OR
BM OR GM
OR
FK

I have found programs that use stacks to convert from infix to postfix ...etc. But this program is different. This needs to resolve the string.

[Ben Souther]

Hmmm....
Sounds like a school assignment..

If this is really about string parsing, then the regexp tools in j2sdk1.4 and up can make short work of this task.

1.) Remove white space.
2.) Split the string into groups on ")|(" (lame but efficient).
3.) For each group, split the groups into pairs on "&".
4.) Remove all non alpha characters (caps in this case).
5.) For each char in the left side of the pair, print
char plus right side of pair.

Like this:

      1 public class StringPuzzle{
      2     public static void main(String[] args){
      3         String in = args[0];
      4         in = in.replaceAll("\\s", "");
      5         String[] groups = in.split("\\)\\|\\(");
      6
      7         for(int i = 0; i < groups.length; i++){
      8             if(i != 0)
      9                 System.out.println("OR");
     10
     11             String[] pairs = groups[i].split("\\&");
     12             String left  = pairs[0].replaceAll("[^A-Z]", "");
     13             String right = pairs[1].replaceAll("[^A-Z]", "");
     14
     15             for(int j = 0; j < left.length(); j++){
     16                 char c = left.charAt(j);
     17
     18                 if(j != 0)
     19                     System.out.print(" OR ");
     20
     21                 System.out.print(c + right);
     22             }
     23             System.out.println();
     24         }
     25     }
     26 }

Now, if this is for a "Data Structures" or "Compiler" class as the title suggests, such an approach would probably get you a failing grade. Go back and look a the stack approach.
[ December 31, 2004: Message edited by: Ben Souther ]