Girish Sahani wrote: > hello ppl, > > Consider a list like ['a.1','b.3','b.4','c.2']. Here 'a','b','c' are > objects and 1,3,4,2 are their instance ids and they are unique e.g. a.1 > and b.1 cannot exist together. From this list i want to generate > multiple lists such that each list must have one and only one instance of > every object. > Thus, for the above list, my output should be: > [['a.1','b.3','c.2'],['a.1','b.4','c.2']] > Another example: Let l = ['a.1','b.3','b.4','c.2','c.6','d.3']. Then > output should be [['a.1','b.3','c.2','d.3'],['a.1','b.3','c.6','d.3'], > ['a.1','b.4','c.2','d.3'],[['a.1','b.4','c.6','d.3'] > > Can anyone suggest me a time-efficient method for doing this?? >
I don't understand what you mean by "'a','b','c' are objects and 1,3,4,2 are their instance ids", but I think the solution to whatever your problem is, will involve the Cartesian Product of sets (lists) - (also called the cross product). If your data is just the strings that you give in your example, then the following should work. If your 'object strings' are longer than one character, you will have to adapt it. print import itertools as it data1 = ['a.1','b.3','b.4','c.2'] data2 = ['a.1','b.3','b.4','c.2','c.6','d.3'] want1 = [['a.1', 'b.3', 'c.2'], ['a.1', 'b.4', 'c.2']] want2 = [['a.1','b.3','c.2','d.3'], ['a.1','b.3','c.6','d.3'], ['a.1','b.4','c.2','d.3'], ['a.1','b.4','c.6','d.3'] ] def split_data(data): ret = [] for k, g in it.groupby(sorted(data), lambda x: x[0]): ret.append( list(g) ) return ret #following function from ASPN Cookbook by David Klaffenbach #http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Cookbook/Python/Recipe/302478 def combine(*seqin): '''returns a list of all combinations of argument sequences. for example: combine((1,2),(3,4)) returns [[1, 3], [1, 4], [2, 3], [2, 4]]''' def rloop(seqin,listout,comb): '''recursive looping function''' if seqin: # any more sequences to process? for item in seqin[0]: newcomb=comb+[item] # add next item to current comb # call rloop w/ rem seqs, newcomb rloop(seqin[1:],listout,newcomb) else: # processing last sequence listout.append(comb) # comb finished, add to list listout=[] # listout initialization rloop(seqin,listout,[]) # start recursive process return listout assert combine(*split_data(data1)) == want1 assert combine(*split_data(data2)) == want2 -------------------------------- Gerard -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list