forked from boostorg/algorithm
Update docs based on feedback, add 'stable_sort', 'partial_sort' and 'nth_element'
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@@ -9,36 +9,66 @@ Distributed under the Boost Software License, Version 1.0.
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(See accompanying file LICENSE_1_0.txt or copy at http://www.boost.org/LICENSE_1_0.txt)
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]
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There are times that you want a sorted version of a sequence, but for some reason or another, you don't really want to sort them. Maybe the elements in the sequence are non-copyable (or non-movable), or the sequence is const, or they're just really expensive to move around. An example of this might be a sequence of records from a database.
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There are times that you want a sorted version of a sequence, but for some reason you don't want to modify it. Maybe the elements in the sequence can't be moved/copied, e.g. the sequence is const, or they're just really expensive to move around. An example of this might be a sequence of records from a database.
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Nevertheless, you might want to sort them. That's where indirect sorting comes in. In a "normal" sort, the elements of the sequence to be sorted are shuffled in place. In indirect sorting, the elements are unchanged, but the sort algorithm returns to you a "permutation" of the elements that, when applied, will leave the elements in the sequence in a sorted order.
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That's where indirect sorting comes in. In a "normal" sort, the elements of the sequence to be sorted are shuffled in place. In indirect sorting, the elements are unchanged, but the sort algorithm returns a "permutation" of the elements that, when applied, will put the elements in the sequence in a sorted order.
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Say you have a sequence `[first, last)` of 1000 items that are expensive to swap:
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Assume have a sequence `[first, last)` of 1000 items that are expensive to swap:
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```
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std::sort(first, last); // ['O(N ln N)] comparisons and ['O(N ln N)] swaps (of the element type).
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```
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On the other hand, using indirect sorting:
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```
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auto permutation = boost::algorithm::indirect_sort(first, last); // ['O(N lg N)] comparisons and ['O(N lg N)] swaps (of size_t).
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boost::algorithm::apply_permutation(first, last, perm.begin(), perm.end()); // ['O(N)] swaps (of the element type)
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auto perm = indirect_sort(first, last); // ['O(N lg N)] comparisons and ['O(N lg N)] swaps (of size_t).
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apply_permutation(first, last, perm.begin(), perm.end()); // ['O(N)] swaps (of the element type)
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```
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If the element type is sufficiently expensive to swap, then 10,000 swaps of size_t + 1000 swaps of the element_type could be cheaper than 10,000 swaps of the element_type.
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Or maybe you don't need the elements to actually be sorted - you just want to traverse them in a sorted order:
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```
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auto permutation = boost::algorithm::indirect_sort(first, last);
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auto permutation = indirect_sort(first, last);
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for (size_t idx: permutation)
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std::cout << first[idx] << std::endl;
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```
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More to come here ....
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Assume that instead of an "array of structures", you have a "struct of arrays"
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```
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struct AType {
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Type0 key;
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Type1 value1;
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Type1 value2;
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};
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std::array<AType, 1000> arrayOfStruct;
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```
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versus:
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```
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template <size_t N>
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struct AType {
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std::array<Type0, N> key;
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std::array<Type1, N> value1;
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std::array<Type2, N> value2;
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};
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AType<1000> structOfArrays;
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```
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Sorting the first one is easy, because each set of fields (`key`, `value1`, `value2`) are part of the same struct. But with indirect sorting, the second one is easy to sort as well - just sort the keys, then apply the permutation to the keys and the values:
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```
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auto perm = indirect_sort(std::begin(structOfArrays.key), std::end(structOfArrays.key));
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apply_permutation(structOfArrays.key.begin(), structOfArrays.key.end(), perm.begin(), perm.end());
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apply_permutation(structOfArrays.value1.begin(), structOfArrays.value1.end(), perm.begin(), perm.end());
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apply_permutation(structOfArrays.value2.begin(), structOfArrays.value2.end(), perm.begin(), perm.end());
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```
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[heading interface]
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The function `indirect_sort` a `vector<size_t>` containing the permutation necessary to put the input sequence into a sorted order. One version uses `std::less` to do the comparisons; the other lets the caller pass predicate to do the comparisons.
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The function `indirect_sort` returns a `vector<size_t>` containing the permutation necessary to put the input sequence into a sorted order. One version uses `std::less` to do the comparisons; the other lets the caller pass predicate to do the comparisons.
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```
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template <typename RAIterator>
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