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Re: Finding the Min for positive and negative in python 3.3 list

Newsgroups comp.lang.python
Date 2013-03-14 04:45 -0700
References <mailman.3239.1363109618.2939.python-list@python.org> <513fdcfc$0$29965$c3e8da3$5496439d@news.astraweb.com> <mailman.3258.1363171436.2939.python-list@python.org>
Subject Re: Finding the Min for positive and negative in python 3.3 list
From 88888 Dihedral <dihedral88888@googlemail.com>
Message-ID <mailman.3297.1363261539.2939.python-list@python.org> (permalink)

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Wolfgang Maier於 2013年3月13日星期三UTC+8下午6時43分38秒寫道:
> Steven D'Aprano <steve+comp.lang.python <at> pearwood.info> writes:
> 
> 
> 
> > 
> 
> > On Tue, 12 Mar 2013 17:03:08 +0000, Norah Jones wrote:
> 
> > 
> 
> > > For example:
> 
> > > a=[-15,-30,-10,1,3,5]
> 
> > > 
> 
> > > I want to find a negative and a positive minimum.
> 
> > > 
> 
> > > example: negative
> 
> > > print(min(a)) = -30
> 
> > >  
> 
> > > positive
> 
> > > print(min(a)) = 1
> 
> > 
> 
> > Thank you for providing examples, but they don't really cover all the 
> 
> > possibilities. For example, if you had:
> 
> > 
> 
> > a = [-1, -2, -3, 100, 200, 300]
> 
> > 
> 
> > I can see that you consider -3 to be the "negative minimum". Do you 
> 
> > consider the "positive minimum" to be 100, or 1?
> 
> > 
> 
> > If you expect it to be 100, then the solution is:
> 
> > 
> 
> >     min([item for item in a if item > 0])
> 
> > 
> 
> > If you expect it to be 1, then the solution is:
> 
> > 
> 
> >     min([abs(item) for item in a])
> 
> > 
> 
> > which could also be written as:
> 
> > 
> 
> >     min(map(abs, a))
> 
> > 
> 
> > A third alternative is in Python 3.3:
> 
> > 
> 
> >     min(a, key=abs)
> 
> > 
> 
> > which will return -1.
> 
> > 
> 
> 
> 
> thinking again about the question, then the min() solutions suggested so far
> 
> certainly do the job and they are easy to understand.
> 
> However, if you need to run the function repeatedly on larger lists, using min()
> 
> is suboptimal because its performance is an O(n) one.
> 
> It's faster, though less intuitive, to sort your list first, then use bisect on
> 
> it to find the zero position in it. Two manipulations running at O(log(n)).
> 
> 
> 
> compare these two functions:
> 
> 
> 
> def with_min(x):
> 
>     return (min(n for n in a if n<0), min(n for n in a if n>=0))
> 
> 
> 
> def with_bisect(x):
> 
>     b=sorted(x)
> 
>     return (b[0] if b[0]<0 else None, b[bisect.bisect_left(b,0)])
> 
> 
> 
> then either time them for small lists or try:
> 
> 
> 
> a=range(-10000000,10000000)
> 
> with_min(a)
> 
> with_bisect(a)
> 
> 
> 
> of course, the disadvantage is that you create a huge sorted list in memory and
> 
> that it's less readable.
> 
> 
> 
> Best,
> 
> Wolfgang

Sorting numbers of such range M in a list of length N by radix sort 
is faster but requires more memory.

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Thread

Finding the Min for positive and negative in python 3.3 list Norah Jones <nh.jones01@gmail.com> - 2013-03-12 17:03 +0000
  Re: Finding the Min for positive and negative in python 3.3 list Steven D'Aprano <steve+comp.lang.python@pearwood.info> - 2013-03-13 01:57 +0000
    Re: Finding the Min for positive and negative in python 3.3 list Wolfgang Maier <wolfgang.maier@biologie.uni-freiburg.de> - 2013-03-13 10:43 +0000
      Re: Finding the Min for positive and negative in python 3.3 list 88888 Dihedral <dihedral88888@googlemail.com> - 2013-03-14 04:45 -0700
      Re: Finding the Min for positive and negative in python 3.3 list 88888 Dihedral <dihedral88888@googlemail.com> - 2013-03-14 04:45 -0700
    Re: Finding the Min for positive and negative in python 3.3 list Oscar Benjamin <oscar.j.benjamin@gmail.com> - 2013-03-13 11:23 +0000
      Re: Finding the Min for positive and negative in python 3.3 list Steven D'Aprano <steve+comp.lang.python@pearwood.info> - 2013-03-13 14:12 +0000
        Re: Finding the Min for positive and negative in python 3.3 list Mark Lawrence <breamoreboy@yahoo.co.uk> - 2013-03-13 14:37 +0000
    Re: Finding the Min for positive and negative in python 3.3 list Wolfgang Maier <wolfgang.maier@biologie.uni-freiburg.de> - 2013-03-13 11:34 +0000
      Re: Finding the Min for positive and negative in python 3.3 list Steven D'Aprano <steve+comp.lang.python@pearwood.info> - 2013-03-13 14:43 +0000
    Re: Finding the Min for positive and negative in python 3.3 list Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com> - 2013-03-13 22:36 +1100
    Re: Finding the Min for positive and negative in python 3.3 list Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com> - 2013-03-13 22:38 +1100
    Re: Finding the Min for positive and negative in python 3.3 list Peter Otten <__peter__@web.de> - 2013-03-13 13:00 +0100
    Re: Finding the Min for positive and negative in python 3.3 list Wolfgang Maier <wolfgang.maier@biologie.uni-freiburg.de> - 2013-03-13 14:17 +0000

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