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# Thursday Code Puzzler: ISBN Validator

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Thursday is code puzzler day here at DZone. The idea is simple: solve the coding problem as efficiently as you can, in any language or framework that you find suitable.

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Check if a given string is an ISBN number

Write a method that will take a string parameter and check if it conforms to the ISBN-13 specification as detailed in Wikipedia.

The calculation of an ISBN-13 check digit begins with the first 12 digits of the thirteen-digit ISBN (thus excluding the check digit itself). Each digit, from left to right, is alternately multiplied by 1 or 3, then those products are summedmodulo10 to give a value ranging from 0 to 9. Subtracted from 10, that leaves a result from 1 to 10. A zero (0) replaces a ten (10), so, in all cases, a single check digit results.

Formally, the ISBN-13 check digit calculation is:
$x_{13} = \big(10 - \big(x_1 + 3x_2 + x_3 + 3x_4 + \cdots + x_{11} + 3x_{12}\big) \,\bmod\, 10\big) \,\bmod\, 10.$

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SEE AN EXAMPLE