Problem 52283. Find numbers in the Popular Computing Z-sequence

• Created by ChrisR
• Appears in Sequences & Series V

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Here’s a quick one. In 1977 the magazine Popular Computing sought “problem situations for which the computer is the best (if not the only) tool for solution” and proposed the Z-sequence as a candidate “problem situation:”

and for

Among the Z-sequence’s properties, the magazine staff pointed out that “successive values seem unpredictable; that is, the values jump around, but not too wildly” and “almost every integer appears as a term in the sequence sooner or later, except for a few numbers, such as 245, 449, 569, 575, and 903.”

Write a function to find the index of the first occurrence of k (including the five numbers above) in the Popular Computing Z-sequence.

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Solution Stats

73.91% Correct | 26.09% Incorrect

• 23 Solutions
• 14 Solvers

Last Solution submitted on Nov 10, 2024

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