A 4-Pics-1-Word solver, which highlights adjectives for easier findings on harder puzzles.

wordr.py

#!/usr/bin/env python
# coding: utf-8

'''
===============================================================================
                        __        __            _
                        \ \      / /__  _ __ __| |_ __
                         \ \ /\ / / _ \| '__/ _` | '__|
                          \ V  V / (_) | | | (_| | |
                           \_/\_/ \___/|_|  \__,_|_|

                             A 4-Pics-1-Word Solver
===============================================================================

Script:         wordr.py
Author:         Sebastian Weigand
Email:          sab@sw-dd.com
Current:        April, 2013
Copyright:      2011-2013, Sebastian Weigand
License:        BSD License
Description:    A 4-Pics-1-Word Solver
Version:        1.0 Beta
Invocation:     ./wordr.py <letters given> <# of letters in answer>
    Ex:         ./wordry.py dvrdwreadrco 4

===============================================================================
'''

from os import access, R_OK
from sys import stdout, stderr, argv

from urllib2 import urlopen, HTTPError
from xml.dom.minidom import parseString

if len(argv) < 3:
    print >> stderr, "Need 2 arguments: <letters given> and <# of letters>"
    exit(1)

# =============================================================================
# Check for our rather large adjectives list:
# =============================================================================

if not access('adjectives.txt', R_OK):

    print >> stderr, "You don't seem to have a list of adjectives, let me fetch one."
    print >> stderr, "(this will only happen once, just don't delete the file)"

    # Store the number of adjectives we've fetched thus far:
    counter = 0

    # Use stdout methods for an improved CLI experience:
    stdout.write('Downloading a list of adjectives from Wiktionary...'.ljust(80))
    stdout.flush()

    # Use Mediawiki's API to fetch a list of all English adjectives:
    baseWikiAPIURL = 'http://en.wiktionary.org/w/api.php?action=query&list=categorymembers&cmtitle=Category:English_adjectives&cmlimit=500&format=xml'

    try:
        results = urlopen(baseWikiAPIURL).read()

    except HTTPError:
        print >> stderr, "Wiktionary's API doesn't seem to be working right now."
        print >> stderr, "Let's try this later, as we need this list to work."
        exit(2)  # 1 is for user cancel

    # We're limited to 500 entries per call, so loop through until we're done:
    while True:

        # Parse the XML:
        dom = parseString(results)

        # Let's save this file, as it's nice to have for later (note the 'a'):
        with open('adjectives.txt', 'a') as f:

            # Fetch the correct element with the correct attributes (see API doc):
            ## Ensure encoding is UTF-8, as we'll get some funky characters:
            ### Make lowercase:
            adjectives = [elem.getAttribute('title').encode('utf-8').lower() for elem in dom.getElementsByTagName('cm') if elem.getAttribute('ns') == '0']
            counter += len(adjectives)
            f.write('\n'.join(adjectives))

        # Overwrite the terminal buffer and keep things nice-and-purty:
        stdout.write('\b' * 10)
        stdout.write(str(counter).rjust(10))
        stdout.flush()

        # Check and see if there's more to fetch (it will always be the last
        #   categorymember element):
        if dom.getElementsByTagName('categorymembers')[0].hasAttribute('cmcontinue'):
            nextLocation = dom.getElementsByTagName('categorymembers')[0].getAttribute('cmcontinue')
            results = urlopen(baseWikiAPIURL + '&cmcontinue=' + nextLocation).read()

        # We're done!
        else:
            print '\n\tDownloaded adjective list.'
            break

if not access('/usr/share/dict/words', R_OK):
    print >> stderr, "You do not appear to have a dictionary installed. If you're on Ubuntu, try: `sudo apt-get install wamerican-insane`"
    exit(1)

# =============================================================================
# Process the fun:
# =============================================================================

with open('/usr/share/dict/words') as f:
    words = f.read().splitlines()

with open('adjectives.txt') as f:
    adjectives = f.read().splitlines()

letters = list(argv[1])
length = int(argv[2])

# Do some housekeeping:
words = [word.lower() for word in words if len(word) == length and ' ' not in word and '-' not in word]

results = []

# Set intersections don't work with duplicated letters,
# but there's probably a better way of doing this:
for word in words:
    new_letters = letters[:]
    good = True
    for letter in word:
        if letter in new_letters:
            new_letters.remove(letter)
        else:
            good = False
            break
    if good:
        results.append(word)

results = sorted(set(results))
adj_results = sorted(set(adjectives).intersection(results))

# =============================================================================
# Print the results:
# =============================================================================

print 'There are %s adjective results:' % len(adj_results)
print '-' * 80
print '\n'.join(adj_results)
print ''
print 'Here are the other %s results:' % len(results)
print '-' * 80
print '\n'.join(results)
print ''