[R] detecting if a variable has changed

Bert Gunter bgunter.4567 at gmail.com
Sun Jun 5 20:13:15 CEST 2016


Nope, Ted. I asked for  a O(log(n)) solution, not an O(n) one.

I will check out the data.table package, as suggested.

-- Bert
Bert Gunter

"The trouble with having an open mind is that people keep coming along
and sticking things into it."
-- Opus (aka Berkeley Breathed in his "Bloom County" comic strip )


On Sun, Jun 5, 2016 at 11:01 AM, Ted Harding <Ted.Harding at wlandres.net> wrote:
> Surely it is straightforward, since the vector (say 'X') is already sorted?
>
> Example (raw code with explicit example):
>
> set.seed(54321)
> X <- sort(runif(10))
> # X ## The initial sorted vector
> # [1] 0.04941009 0.17669234 0.20913493 0.21651016 0.27439354
> # [6] 0.34161241 0.37165878 0.42900782 0.49843042 0.86636110
>
> y <- runif(1)
> # y ## The new value to be inserted
> [1] 0.1366424
>
> Y <- c(X[X<=y],y,X[X>y]) ## Now insert y into X:
> Y
> [1] 0.04941009 0.13664239 0.17669234 0.20913493 0.21651016 0.27439354
> [7] 0.34161241 0.37165878 0.42900782 0.49843042 0.86636110
>
> ## And there it is at Y[2]
>
> Easy to make such a function!
> Best wishes to all,
> Ted.
>
> On 05-Jun-2016 17:44:29 Neal H. Walfield wrote:
>> On Sun, 05 Jun 2016 19:34:38 +0200,
>> Bert Gunter wrote:
>>> This help thread suggested a question to me:
>>>
>>> Is there a function in some package that efficiently (I.e. O(log(n)) )
>>> inserts a single new element into the correct location in an
>>> already-sorted vector? My assumption here is that doing it via sort()
>>> is inefficient, but maybe that is incorrect. Please correct me if so.
>>
>> I think data.table will do this if the the column is marked
>> appropriately.
>>
>>> I realize that it would be straightforward to write such a function,
>>> but I just wondered if it already exists. My google & rseek searches
>>> did not succeed, but maybe I used the wrong keywords.
>>>
>>> Cheers,
>>> Bert
>>>
>>>
>>> Bert Gunter
>>>
>>> "The trouble with having an open mind is that people keep coming along
>>> and sticking things into it."
>>> -- Opus (aka Berkeley Breathed in his "Bloom County" comic strip )
>>>
>>>
>>> On Sun, Jun 5, 2016 at 9:47 AM, William Dunlap via R-help
>>> <r-help at r-project.org> wrote:
>>> > I don't know what you mean by "without having to use any special
>>> > interfaces", but "reference classes" will do what I think you want.  E.g.,
>>> > the following makes a class called 'SortedNumeric' that only sorts the
>>> > vector when you want to get its value, not when you append values.  It
>>> > stores the sorted vector so it does not get resorted each time you ask for
>>> > it.
>>> >
>>> > SortedNumeric <- setRefClass("sortedNumeric",
>>> >             fields = list(
>>> >                 fData = "numeric",
>>> >                 fIsUnsorted = "logical"),
>>> >             methods = list(
>>> >                 initialize = function(Data = numeric(), isUnsorted = TRUE)
>>> >                 {
>>> >                     fData <<- Data
>>> >                     stopifnot(is.logical(isUnsorted),
>>> >                               length(isUnsorted)==1,
>>> >                               !is.na(isUnsorted))
>>> >                     fIsUnsorted <<- isUnsorted
>>> >                 },
>>> >                 getData = function() {
>>> >                     if (isUnsorted) {
>>> >                         fData <<- sort(fData)
>>> >                         fIsUnsorted <<- FALSE
>>> >                     }
>>> >                     fData
>>> >                 },
>>> >                 appendData = function(newEntries) {
>>> >                     fData <<- c(fData, newEntries)
>>> >                     fIsUnsorted <<- TRUE
>>> >                 }
>>> >             ))
>>> >
>>> > Use it as:
>>> >
>>> >> x <- SortedNumeric$new()
>>> >> x$appendData(c(4,2,5))
>>> >> x$appendData(c(1,8,9))
>>> >> x
>>> > Reference class object of class "sortedNumeric"
>>> > Field "fData":
>>> > [1] 4 2 5 1 8 9
>>> > Field "fIsUnsorted":
>>> > [1] TRUE
>>> >> x$getData()
>>> > [1] 1 2 4 5 8 9
>>> >> x
>>> > Reference class object of class "sortedNumeric"
>>> > Field "fData":
>>> > [1] 1 2 4 5 8 9
>>> > Field "fIsUnsorted":
>>> > [1] FALSE
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > Outside of base R, I think the R6 package gives another approach to this.
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > Bill Dunlap
>>> > TIBCO Software
>>> > wdunlap tibco.com
>>> >
>>> > On Sun, Jun 5, 2016 at 6:53 AM, Neal H. Walfield <neal at walfield.org>
>>> > wrote:
>>> >
>>> >> Hi,
>>> >>
>>> >> I have a huge list.  Normally it is sorted, but I want to be able to
>>> >> add elements to it without having to use any special interfaces and
>>> >> then sort it on demand.  My idea is to use something like weak
>>> >> references combined with attributes.  Consider:
>>> >>
>>> >>   # Initialization.
>>> >>   l = as.list(1:10)
>>> >>   # Note that it is sorted.
>>> >>   attr(l, 'sorted') = weakref(l)
>>> >>
>>> >>   # Modify the list.
>>> >>   l = append(l, 1:3)
>>> >>
>>> >>   # Check if the list is still sorted.  (I use identical here, but it
>>> >>   # probably too heavy weight: I just need to compare the addresses.)
>>> >>   if (! identical(l, attr(l, 'sorted'))) {
>>> >>     l = sort(unlist(l))
>>> >>     attr(l, 'sorted') = weakref(l)
>>> >>   }
>>> >>   # Do operation that requires sorted list.
>>> >>   ...
>>> >>
>>> >> This is obviously a toy example.  I'm not actually sorting integers
>>> >> and I may use a matrix instead of a list.
>>> >>
>>> >> I've read:
>>> >>
>>> >>   http://www.hep.by/gnu/r-patched/r-exts/R-exts_122.html
>>> >>   http://homepage.stat.uiowa.edu/~luke/R/references/weakfinex.html
>>> >>
>>> >> As far as I can tell, weakrefs are only available via the C API.  Is
>>> >> there a way to do what I want in R without resorting to C code?  Is
>>> >> what I want to do better achieved using something other than weakrefs?
>>> >>
>>> >> Thanks!
>>> >>
>>> >> :) Neal
>>> >>
>>> >> ______________________________________________
>>> >> R-help at r-project.org mailing list -- To UNSUBSCRIBE and more, see
>>> >> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help
>>> >> PLEASE do read the posting guide
>>> >> http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html
>>> >> and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
>>> >>
>>> >
>>> >         [[alternative HTML version deleted]]
>>> >
>>> > ______________________________________________
>>> > R-help at r-project.org mailing list -- To UNSUBSCRIBE and more, see
>>> > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help
>>> > PLEASE do read the posting guide
>>> > http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html
>>> > and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
>>>
>>
>> ______________________________________________
>> R-help at r-project.org mailing list -- To UNSUBSCRIBE and more, see
>> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help
>> PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html
>> and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
>
> -------------------------------------------------
> E-Mail: (Ted Harding) <Ted.Harding at wlandres.net>
> Date: 05-Jun-2016  Time: 19:01:10
> This message was sent by XFMail
> -------------------------------------------------



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