Problem 42. Find the alphabetic word product

Created by Cody Team

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Last Solution submitted on Jun 01, 2023

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Jason Friedman on 27 Jan 2012

For the bonus question (on OSX):

words= textread('/usr/share/dict/words','%s');

for k=1:numel(words)
wordprod(k) = word_product(words{k});
end
[~,i] = min(abs(wordprod-1000000));
words{i}
wordprod(i)

% curing with word product of 1000188

Everett Rubel on 14 Oct 2012

For the bonus question, we can rule out any number that has a prime factor greater than 26 (z). The product found by Jason Friedman is the first number greater than 10^6 that does not have such a prime factor. The product 999856 is the largest number less than 10^6 to be part of a possible solution.

Krzysztof on 5 Jun 2013

I like playing with strings and ASCII table ;)

Jon on 4 Dec 2013

Everett appears to miss the fact that 1000000 has no prime factors above 26, and Jason's dictionary doesn't seem to include obsolete words. 'tetty' scores a perfect 1000000.

John D'Errico on 20 Aug 2016

Well, if you happen to know someone named 'BettyJ', thus a first name of Betty, last initial J, this works: word_product('BettyJ').

arda ertuna on 20 May 2019

Could you send me the answer?
I had benn worked for 1 week but Icouldnt find answer. İf anyone solves Please send answer. Really I need it.

Maryam HCTRAK Yousef on 29 Aug 2020

Nice problem

A C on 15 Dec 2020

Can you give me a hint on how to program the bonus question? I used factor but that is not a good way.

Joel Hottinger on 8 Jul 2021

If we can include multiple words in our bonus answer, the word "tea" 3 times scores perfect. n = 'teateatea'

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Problem 42. Find the alphabetic word product

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