On Sun, 07 Jan 2007 22:23:22 +0100, "Michael M." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> How to find the longst element list of lists? > I think, there should be an easier way then this: > s1 = ["q", "e", "d"] > s2 = ["a", "b"] > s3 = ["a", "b", "c", "d"] [ snip ] One more thing to think about: if your list of lists grows (i.e., if you end up with thousands of lists instead of just three), then sorting may not be the way to go. Assuming that list_of_lists is your list of lists, then something like this: longest_list, longest_length = list_of_lists[ 0 ], len( longest_list ) for a_list in list_of_lists[ 1 : ]: a_length = len( a_list ) if a_length > longest_length: longest_list, longest_length = a_list, a_length will run faster than sorting the list just to pick off one element (O(n) vs. O(n log n) for all of you Big-Oh notation fans out there; you know who you are!). Regards, Dan -- Dan Sommers <http://www.tombstonezero.net/dan/> "I wish people would die in alphabetical order." -- My wife, the genealogist -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list