input: Develop a function that determines the minimum count of alterations required to transform an array of integers into a palindromic sequence. A palindromic array is one that reads identical forwards and backwards. Each modification allows changing one element to any other element.
  assert smallest_alterations([1,2,3,5,4,7,9,6]) == 4
  assert smallest_alterations([1, 2, 3, 4, 3, 2, 2]) == 1
  assert smallest_alterations([1, 4, 2]) == 1
  assert smallest_alterations([1, 4, 4, 2]) == 1
  assert smallest_alterations([1, 2, 3, 2, 1]) == 0
  assert smallest_alterations([3, 1, 1, 3]) == 0
  assert smallest_alterations([1]) == 0
  assert smallest_alterations([0, 1]) == 1
output:     def smallest_alterations(arr):
      n = len(arr)
      count = 0
      for i in range(n // 2):
          if arr[i] != arr[n - i - 1]:
              count += 1
      return count