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I've already attempted it but I am finding it difficult to understand if this is correct.

give a context free grammar for the following:

$$ \{p^{3m+n}q^nr^2p^m\mid m,n\ge 0 \}$$

The answer i've attempted is:
$S \to XY$
$X \to pppXp \mid \ q$
$Y \to qYr \mid \epsilon$

I've been trying to understand if i need to break down: $$ \{p^{3+m+n} \}$$ in to

$$ \{p^{3}p^m p^n \}$$

to give me: pppXp

then q and r would value to

qYr | $\epsilon$

James arthur
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1 Answers1

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A common approach to figure out a context-free grammar for some simple languages is to find, by peeling off terminals, smaller and smaller languages that are nicely structured such that if you use a nonterminal to represent each smaller language, you can restore the larger languages from the smaller ones with a production rule.

$S=\{p^{3m+n}q^nr^2p^m\mid m,n\ge 0 \}$

If you peel off $p^3$ from the front and $p$ from the back $m$ times, you got language $B=\{p^nq^nr^2\mid n\ge 0 \}$. Can you see how to produce $S$ from $B$ by one production rule? In fact, that is part of what you have written.

Peeling off $r^2$ at the end, you get language $C=\{p^nq^n\mid n\ge 0 \}$. Can you get $B$ from $C$? Can you produce/recall a context-free grammar for $C$?

John L.
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