Formation flying basics in Drone Programming - Practice Problems & Coding Challenges

Challenge - 5 Problems

❓ Predict Output

intermediate

What is the output of this drone formation position update?

Consider a drone formation where each drone updates its position based on the leader's position plus an offset. What will be the new position of drone B after running the code?

Drone Programming

leader_position = (10, 20)
drone_offsets = {'A': (0, 0), 'B': (5, -3), 'C': (-4, 2)}
new_positions = {drone: (leader_position[0] + offset[0], leader_position[1] + offset[1]) for drone, offset in drone_offsets.items()}
print(new_positions['B'])

A (15, 23)

B (5, 17)

C (15, 17)

D (10, 20)

💡 Hint

Add the leader's x and y to the drone's offset x and y respectively.

Drone B's new position is calculated by adding its offset (5, -3) to the leader's position (10, 20), resulting in (15, 17).

🧠 Conceptual

intermediate

Which formation pattern is represented by these relative positions?

Given the relative positions of drones from the leader as: {'A': (0, 0), 'B': (5, 0), 'C': (10, 0), 'D': (15, 0)}, what formation shape do they form?

A Line formation

B V formation

C Diamond formation

D Square formation

💡 Hint

Look at the y-coordinates of all drones.

All drones have the same y-coordinate (0) and increasing x-coordinates, so they form a straight line.

🔧 Debug

advanced

Why does this formation update code raise an error?

This code is intended to update drone positions but raises an error. Identify the cause.

Drone Programming

leader_pos = (10, 10)
drone_offsets = {'A': (1, 2), 'B': (3, 4)}
new_positions = {drone: (leader_pos[0] + offset[0], leader_pos[1] + offset[1]) for drone, offset in drone_offsets.items()}
print(new_positions)

A SyntaxError due to incorrect dictionary comprehension syntax

B TypeError because of adding tuple and int

C KeyError because 'leader_pos' key missing

D No error, outputs correct positions

💡 Hint

Check the placement of commas and parentheses in the dictionary comprehension.

The dictionary comprehension is missing parentheses around the tuple for the value, causing a syntax error.

📝 Syntax

advanced

Which option correctly defines a function to calculate drone formation positions?

Select the correct function syntax that takes leader position and offsets dict, and returns new positions dict.

A

def calc_positions(leader, offsets):
    return {d: leader[0] + o[0], leader[1] + o[1] for d, o in offsets.items()}

B

def calc_positions(leader, offsets):
    return {d: (leader[0] + o[0]) + (leader[1] + o[1]) for d, o in offsets.items()}

C

def calc_positions(leader, offsets):
    return {d: leader[0] + o[0] + leader[1] + o[1] for d, o in offsets.items()}

D

def calc_positions(leader, offsets):
    return {d: (leader[0] + o[0], leader[1] + o[1]) for d, o in offsets.items()}

💡 Hint

Remember to return a tuple for each drone's position.

Option D correctly returns a dictionary with drone keys and tuple values representing positions.

🚀 Application

expert

How many drones are in formation after this update?

Given the code below, how many drones have updated positions stored in new_positions?

Drone Programming

leader = (0, 0)
drone_offsets = {'A': (1, 1), 'B': (2, 2), 'C': (3, 3), 'D': (4, 4)}
new_positions = {}
for drone, offset in drone_offsets.items():
    if offset[0] + offset[1] > 4:
        new_positions[drone] = (leader[0] + offset[0], leader[1] + offset[1])
print(len(new_positions))

A 3

B 2

C 1

D 4

💡 Hint

Sum the x and y offsets and check which are greater than 4.

Only drones 'C' (3+3=6) and 'D' (4+4=8) have sums greater than 4, so 2 drones are in new_positions.