Spiral Hourglass of Numbers

This program prints an hourglass filled with numbers in spiral order.

Problem Statement

Write a Java program that prints an hourglass of numbers arranged in spiral order with 7 rows.

Source Code

1 public class SpiralHourglassNumbers {
2 public static void main(String[] args) {
3 int n = 7;
4 int[][] arr = new int[n][n];
5 int top=0, left=0, bottom=n-1, right=n-1, num=1;
6 while(top<=bottom && left<=right) {
7 for(int i=left; i<=right; i++) arr[top][i]=num++;
8 top++;
9 for(int i=top; i<=bottom; i++) arr[i][right]=num++;
10 right--;
11 for(int i=right; i>=left; i--) arr[bottom][i]=num++;
12 bottom--;
13 for(int i=bottom; i>=top; i--) arr[i][left]=num++;
14 left++;
15 }
16 for(int i=0; i<n; i++) {
17 for(int j=0; j<n; j++) {
18 if(i<=j && i+j>=n-1) System.out.print(arr[i][j] + "\t");
19 else System.out.print(" \t");
20 }
21 System.out.println();
22 }
23 }
24 }

Program Output

            1   2   3   4   5   6   7   
        20  21  22  23  24  25      
    19  32  33  34  35  26          
18  31  36  37  38  27              
17  30  29  28                      
16  15  14                          
13                                  

Explanation

A full square spiral matrix of numbers is built first, and then a printing condition (i<=j && i+j>=n-1) selectively shows only the cells forming an hourglass shape, hiding the rest with blanks.

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