Project Euler Forum

I think I know the answer but would like to verify it: how exactly is a uniform coating defined? In other words, how would I take the measurement to get 1 mm?

mdean wrote:I think I know the answer but would like to verify it: how exactly is a uniform coating defined? In other words, how would I take the measurement to get 1 mm?

From any point on the outside chocolate surface, the closest point on the candy center is at a distance of 1 mm exactly.

Bah! I've spent way too long on this problem as it is and after tons and tons of messy work (got a feeling I'm doing this the hard way...) finally wrote a program. Problem is I reversed a and b. a>b instead of b>a sadly throws off all my work. I'll have to start a lot of it over.

I did however get an answer from my program and I'm curious to know whether or not it's right. Any chance someone can pm me the result for a=1 mm, b=2 mm, just to see if I'm on the right track?

Update: Sorry, if I were thinking, I would have asked if I could pm my result, but I've already gotten a response and, if he was correct, which he probably was, I was way off. Not sure if that was from the hand calculations (which were extremely messy, and I'll need to redo it anyway), the implementation, or the reasoning behind everything. Either way, this looks grim...

I've verified the program seems to be working correctly (corrected some mistakes so it gets what Wolfram says it should get...). Problem now is either my work done by hand or my reasoning. If the problem's my reasoning I need to scrap everything. If the problem's my work by hand, I can probably adjust some values and try again.