Develop Reference

How can I get a sum from some elements of a list? [duplicate]

I have a list of numbers. I also have a certain sum. The sum is made from a few numbers from my list (I may/may not know how many numbers it's made from). Is there a fast algorithm to get a list of possible numbers? Written in Python would be great, but pseudo-code's good too. (I can't yet read anything other than Python :P )
Example
list = [1,2,3,10]
sum = 12
result = [2,10]
NOTE: I do know of Algorithm to find which numbers from a list of size n sum to another number (but I cannot read C# and I'm unable to check if it works for my needs. I'm on Linux and I tried using Mono but I get errors and I can't figure out how to work C# :(
AND I do know of algorithm to sum up a list of numbers for all combinations (but it seems to be fairly inefficient. I don't need all combinations.)

This problem reduces to the 0-1 Knapsack Problem, where you are trying to find a set with an exact sum. The solution depends on the constraints, in the general case this problem is NP-Complete.
However, if the maximum search sum (let's call it S) is not too high, then you can solve the problem using dynamic programming. I will explain it using a recursive function and memoization, which is easier to understand than a bottom-up approach.
Let's code a function f(v, i, S), such that it returns the number of subsets in v[i:] that sums exactly to S. To solve it recursively, first we have to analyze the base (i.e.: v[i:] is empty):
S == 0: The only subset of [] has sum 0, so it is a valid subset. Because of this, the function should return 1.
S != 0: As the only subset of [] has sum 0, there is not a valid subset. Because of this, the function should return 0.
Then, let's analyze the recursive case (i.e.: v[i:] is not empty). There are two choices: include the number v[i] in the current subset, or not include it. If we include v[i], then we are looking subsets that have sum S - v[i], otherwise, we are still looking for subsets with sum S. The function f might be implemented in the following way:
def f(v, i, S):
if i >= len(v): return 1 if S == 0 else 0
count = f(v, i + 1, S)
count += f(v, i + 1, S - v[i])
return count
v = [1, 2, 3, 10]
sum = 12
print(f(v, 0, sum))
By checking f(v, 0, S) > 0, you can know if there is a solution to your problem. However, this code is too slow, each recursive call spawns two new calls, which leads to an O(2^n) algorithm. Now, we can apply memoization to make it run in time O(n*S), which is faster if S is not too big:
def f(v, i, S, memo):
if i >= len(v): return 1 if S == 0 else 0
if (i, S) not in memo: # <-- Check if value has not been calculated.
count = f(v, i + 1, S, memo)
count += f(v, i + 1, S - v[i], memo)
memo[(i, S)] = count # <-- Memoize calculated result.
return memo[(i, S)] # <-- Return memoized value.
v = [1, 2, 3, 10]
sum = 12
memo = dict()
print(f(v, 0, sum, memo))
Now, it is possible to code a function g that returns one subset that sums S. To do this, it is enough to add elements only if there is at least one solution including them:
def f(v, i, S, memo):
# ... same as before ...
def g(v, S, memo):
subset = []
for i, x in enumerate(v):
# Check if there is still a solution if we include v[i]
if f(v, i + 1, S - x, memo) > 0:
subset.append(x)
S -= x
return subset
v = [1, 2, 3, 10]
sum = 12
memo = dict()
if f(v, 0, sum, memo) == 0: print("There are no valid subsets.")
else: print(g(v, sum, memo))
Disclaimer: This solution says there are two subsets of [10, 10] that sums 10. This is because it assumes that the first ten is different to the second ten. The algorithm can be fixed to assume that both tens are equal (and thus answer one), but that is a bit more complicated.

I know I'm giving an answer 10 years later since you asked this, but i really needed to know how to do this an the way jbernadas did it was too hard for me, so i googled it for an hour and I found a python library itertools that gets the job done!
I hope this help to future newbie programmers.
You just have to import the library and use the .combinations() method, it is that simple, it returns all the subsets in a set with order, I mean:
For the set [1, 2, 3, 4] and a subset with length 3 it will not return [1, 2, 3][1, 3, 2][2, 3, 1] it will return just [1, 2, 3]
As you want ALL the subsets of a set you can iterate it:
import itertools
sequence = [1, 2, 3, 4]
for i in range(len(sequence)):
for j in itertools.combinations(sequence, i):
print(j)
The output will be
()
(1,)
(2,)
(3,)
(4,)
(1, 2)
(1, 3)
(1, 4)
(2, 3)
(2, 4)
(3, 4)
(1, 2, 3)
(1, 2, 4)
(1, 3, 4)
(2, 3, 4)
Hope this help!

So, the logic is to reverse sort the numbers,and suppose the list of numbers is l and sum to be formed is s.
for i in b:
if(a(round(n-i,2),b[b.index(i)+1:])):
r.append(i)
return True
return False
then, we go through this loop and a number is selected from l in order and let say it is i .
there are 2 possible cases either i is the part of sum or not.
So, we assume that i is part of solution and then the problem reduces to l being l[l.index(i+1):] and s being s-i so, if our function is a(l,s) then we call a(l[l.index(i+1):] ,s-i). and if i is not a part of s then we have to form s from l[l.index(i+1):] list.
So it is similar in both the cases , only change is if i is part of s, then s=s-i and otherwise s=s only.
now to reduce the problem such that in case numbers in l are greater than s we remove them to reduce the complexity until l is empty and in that case the numbers which are selected are not a part of our solution and we return false.
if(len(b)==0):
return False
while(b[0]>n):
b.remove(b[0])
if(len(b)==0):
return False
and in case l has only 1 element left then either it can be part of s then we return true or it is not then we return false and loop will go through other number.
if(b[0]==n):
r.append(b[0])
return True
if(len(b)==1):
return False
note in the loop if have used b..but b is our list only.and i have rounded wherever it is possible, so that we should not get wrong answer due to floating point calculations in python.
r=[]
list_of_numbers=[61.12,13.11,100.12,12.32,200,60.00,145.34,14.22,100.21,14.77,214.35,200.32,65.43,0.49,132.13,143.21,156.34,11.32,12.34,15.67,17.89,21.23,14.21,12,122,134]
list_of_numbers=sorted(list_of_numbers)
list_of_numbers.reverse()
sum_to_be_formed=401.54
def a(n,b):
global r
if(len(b)==0):
return False
while(b[0]>n):
b.remove(b[0])
if(len(b)==0):
return False
if(b[0]==n):
r.append(b[0])
return True
if(len(b)==1):
return False
for i in b:
if(a(round(n-i,2),b[b.index(i)+1:])):
r.append(i)
return True
return False
if(a(sum_to_be_formed,list_of_numbers)):
print(r)
this solution works fast.more fast than one explained above.
However this works for positive numbers only.
However also it works good if there is a solution only otherwise it takes to much time to get out of loops.
an example run is like this lets say
l=[1,6,7,8,10]
and s=22 i.e. s=1+6+7+8
so it goes through like this
1.) [10, 8, 7, 6, 1] 22
i.e. 10 is selected to be part of 22..so s=22-10=12 and l=l.remove(10)
2.) [8, 7, 6, 1] 12
i.e. 8 is selected to be part of 12..so s=12-8=4 and l=l.remove(8)
3.) [7, 6, 1] 4
now 7,6 are removed and 1!=4 so it will return false for this execution where 8 is selected.
4.)[6, 1] 5
i.e. 7 is selected to be part of 12..so s=12-7=5 and l=l.remove(7)
now 6 are removed and 1!=5 so it will return false for this execution where 7 is selected.
5.)[1] 6
i.e. 6 is selected to be part of 12..so s=12-6=6 and l=l.remove(6)
now 1!=6 so it will return false for this execution where 6 is selected.
6.)[] 11
i.e. 1 is selected to be part of 12..so s=12-1=1 and l=l.remove(1)
now l is empty so all the cases for which 10 was a part of s are false and so 10 is not a part of s and we now start with 8 and same cases follow.
7.)[7, 6, 1] 14
8.)[6, 1] 7
9.)[1] 1
just to give a comparison which i ran on my computer which is not so good.
using
l=[61.12,13.11,100.12,12.32,200,60.00,145.34,14.22,100.21,14.77,214.35,145.21,123.56,11.90,200.32,65.43,0.49,132.13,143.21,156.34,11.32,12.34,15.67,17.89,21.23,14.21,12,122,134]
and
s=2000
my loop ran 1018 times and 31 ms.
and previous code loop ran 3415587 times and took somewhere near 16 seconds.
however in case a solution does not exist my code ran more than few minutes so i stopped it and previous code ran near around 17 ms only and previous code works with negative numbers also.
so i thing some improvements can be done.

#!/usr/bin/python2
ylist = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 2, 5, 3, -1]
print ylist
target = int(raw_input("enter the target number"))
for i in xrange(len(ylist)):
sno = target-ylist[i]
for j in xrange(i+1, len(ylist)):
if ylist[j] == sno:
print ylist[i], ylist[j]
This python code do what you asked, it will print the unique pair of numbers whose sum is equal to the target variable.
if target number is 8, it will print:
1 7
2 6
3 5
3 5
5 3
6 2
9 -1
5 3

I have found an answer which has run-time complexity O(n) and space complexity about O(2n), where n is the length of the list.
The answer satisfies the following constraints:
List can contain duplicates, e.g. [1,1,1,2,3] and you want to find pairs sum to 2
List can contain both positive and negative integers
The code is as below, and followed by the explanation:
def countPairs(k, a):
# List a, sum is k
temp = dict()
count = 0
for iter1 in a:
temp[iter1] = 0
temp[k-iter1] = 0
for iter2 in a:
temp[iter2] += 1
for iter3 in list(temp.keys()):
if iter3 == k / 2 and temp[iter3] > 1:
count += temp[iter3] * (temp[k-iter3] - 1) / 2
elif iter3 == k / 2 and temp[iter3] <= 1:
continue
else:
count += temp[iter3] * temp[k-iter3] / 2
return int(count)
Create an empty dictionary, iterate through the list and put all the possible keys in the dict with initial value 0.
Note that the key (k-iter1) is necessary to specify, e.g. if the list contains 1 but not contains 4, and the sum is 5. Then when we look at 1, we would like to find how many 4 do we have, but if 4 is not in the dict, then it will raise an error.
Iterate through the list again, and count how many times that each integer occurs and store the results to the dict.
Iterate through through the dict, this time is to find how many pairs do we have. We need to consider 3 conditions:
3.1 The key is just half of the sum and this key occurs more than once in the list, e.g. list is [1,1,1], sum is 2. We treat this special condition as what the code does.
3.2 The key is just half of the sum and this key occurs only once in the list, we skip this condition.
3.3 For other cases that key is not half of the sum, just multiply the its value with another key's value where these two keys sum to the given value. E.g. If sum is 6, we multiply temp[1] and temp[5], temp[2] and temp[4], etc... (I didn't list cases where numbers are negative, but idea is the same.)
The most complex step is step 3, which involves searching the dictionary, but as searching the dictionary is usually fast, nearly constant complexity. (Although worst case is O(n), but should not happen for integer keys.) Thus, with assuming the searching is constant complexity, the total complexity is O(n) as we only iterate the list many times separately.
Advice for a better solution is welcomed :)

Math formula behind this find_single_in_triplets() function?

I came across this interesting function, which is to find the only single number (appear once) in an integer list, all other numbers are positive and appears as triplets (3 occurrences).
It works fine as the example shown below.
However, I cannot figure out what is the math formula that it's derived from. Hope someone can shed the light on this puzzle.
def find_single_in_triplets(L):
orig_sum = sum(L)
set_sum = sum(set(L)
return (set_sum * 3 - orig_sum) // 2 # given the single num.
find_single_in_triples([1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 2, 3, 4, 1, 3, 2, 1, 4]) # -> 6

More of a math problem really, but, it's pretty simple reasoning going on here.
Take your list of numbers L that contains this one unknown number x.
If we add 2 extra x's so that all numbers appear 3 times, then the sum sum(L) + 2*x will of course be equal to sum(set(L))*3.
Thus sum(set(L))*3 - sum(L) = 2*x. Just divide by 2 and you are done.
Of course, this not only works for triplets, and we can generalize
def find_single_in_n(L, n):
orig_sum = sum(L)
set_sum = sum(set(L))
return (set_sum * n - orig_sum) // (n-1)
find_single_in_n([1,1,1,1,2,3,3,3,3], 4)

How to plug f(k) in to a series?

Lets suppose you have f(x)=x^2 and you want a series from k=1 to n of f(k). How would you enter it in python and print the result?
I tried doing this for n=10
n=10
def f(x):
return x^2
sum = 0
for k in range(1, n):
Sum = sum + f(k)
I don't know how to print it let alone whether I did it correctly.
I know you can represent a sum of k^2 as n(n+1)(2n+1)/6 but I am just using x^2 as an example.

First off sum is a builtin function so you should not use it as a variable name as python will simply let you overwrite the variable in the spirit of "we are all consenting adults here". Example
type(sum)
# <type 'builtin_function_or_method'>
sum = 0
type(sum)
# <type 'int'>
Now to your question. One way is to first generate the sequence and use the aforementioned sum function as the following examples show.
Generate the sequence using a so-called list comprehension to evaluate the function for each element in a range:
n = 5
def f(x):
return x*x
print([ f(i) for i in range(n)])
# [0, 1, 4, 9, 16]
print(sum([ f(i) for i in range(n)]))
# 30
Use the builtin map function to apply a function, either defined using def or lambda, on a range:
n = 10
f = lambda x: x*x
print(map(f, range(n)))
# [0, 1, 4, 9, 16]
# one line equivalent : print(map(lambda x: x*x, range(n)))
print(sum(map(f, range(n))))
# 30
Alternatively, you can follow your train of thought and use a simple loop and a variable:
n = 5
f = lambda x: x*x
s = 0
for i in range(n):
s += f(i)
print(s)
# 30
Finally, if speed/efficiency is a factor that you have to account for you can have a look at the numpy library. See for instance one of my answers on applying a funcion over a range.

Algorithm to find least sum of squares of differences

Basically this algorithm I'm writing takes as input a List L and wants to find a number x such that all items in L, i, minus x squared and summed are minimized. Find minimum x for the sum of abs(L[i]-x)**2. So far my algorithm is doing what it's supposed to, just not in the cases of floating. I'm not sure how to implement floating. For example [2, 2, 3, 4] ideally would yield the result 2.75, but my algorithm isn't currently capable of yielding floating integers.
def minimize_square(L):
sumsqdiff = 0
sumsqdiffs = {}
for j in range(min(L), max(L)):
for i in range(len(L)-1):
sumsqdiff += abs(L[i]-j)**2
sumsqdiffs[j]=sumsqdiff
sumsqdiff = 0
return min(sumsqdiffs, key=sumsqdiffs.get)

It is easy to prove [*] that the number that minimizes the sum of squared differences is the arithmetic mean of L. This gives the following simple solution:
In [26]: L = [2, 2, 3, 4]
In [27]: sum(L) / float(len(L))
Out[27]: 2.75
or, using NumPy:
In [28]: numpy.mean(L)
Out[28]: 2.75
[*] Here is an outline of the proof:
We need to find x that minimizes f(x) = sum((x - L[i])**2) where the sum is taken over i=0..n-1.
Take the derivative of f(x) and set it to zero:
2*sum(x - L[i]) = 0
Using simple algebra, the above can be transformed into
x = sum(L[i]) / n
which is none other than the arithmetic mean of L. QED.

I am not 100% sure this is the most efficient way to do this but what you could do is mantain the same algorithm that you have and modify the return statement.
min_int = min(sumsqdiffs, key=sumsqdiffs.get)
return bisection(L,min_int-1,min_int+1)
where bisection implement the following method: Bisection Method
This works iff there is a single minimum for the function in the analyzed interval.

How does reduce function work?

As far as I understand, the reduce function takes a list l and a function f. Then, it calls the function f on first two elements of the list and then repeatedly calls the function f with the next list element and the previous result.
So, I define the following functions:
The following function computes the factorial.
def fact(n):
if n == 0 or n == 1:
return 1
return fact(n-1) * n
def reduce_func(x,y):
return fact(x) * fact(y)
lst = [1, 3, 1]
print reduce(reduce_func, lst)
Now, shouldn't this give me ((1! * 3!) * 1!) = 6? But, instead it gives 720. Why 720? It seems to take the factorial of 6 too. But, I need to understand why.
Can someone explains why this happens and a work-around?
I basically want to compute the product of factorials of all the entries in the list.
The backup plan is to run a loop and compute it. But, I would prefer using reduce.

The other answers are great. I'll simply add an illustrated example that I find pretty good to understand reduce():
>>> reduce(lambda x,y: x+y, [47,11,42,13])
113
will be computed as follows:
(Source) (mirror)

The easiest way to understand reduce() is to look at its pure Python equivalent code:
def myreduce(func, iterable, start=None):
it = iter(iterable)
if start is None:
try:
start = next(it)
except StopIteration:
raise TypeError('reduce() of empty sequence with no initial value')
accum_value = start
for x in iterable:
accum_value = func(accum_value, x)
return accum_value
You can see that it only makes sense for your reduce_func() to apply the factorial to the rightmost argument:
def fact(n):
if n == 0 or n == 1:
return 1
return fact(n-1) * n
def reduce_func(x,y):
return x * fact(y)
lst = [1, 3, 1]
print reduce(reduce_func, lst)
With that small revision, the code produces 6 as you expected :-)

Your function calls fact() on both arguments. You are calculating ((1! * 3!)! * 1!). The workaround is to only call it on only the second argument, and pass reduce() an initial value of 1.

From the Python reduce documentation,
reduce(function, sequence) returns a single value constructed by calling the (binary) function on the first two items of the sequence, then on the result and the next item, and so on.
So, stepping through. It computes reduce_func of the first two elements, reduce_func(1, 3) = 1! * 3! = 6. Then, it computes reduce_func of the result and the next item: reduce_func(6, 1) = 6! * 1! = 720.
You missed that, when the result of the first reduce_func call is passed as input to the second, it's factorialized before the multiplication.

Ok, got it:
I need to map the numbers to their factorials first and then call reduce with multiply operator.
So, this would work:
lst_fact = map(fact, lst)
reduce(operator.mul, lst_fact)

You could also implement factorial using reduce.
def factorial(n):
return(reduce(lambda x,y:x*y,range(n+1)[1:]))

Beyond the trivial examples, here is one where I find reduce to be actually quite useful:
Imagine an iterable of ordered int values, often with some runs of contiguous values, and that we'd like to "summarize" it as a list of tuples representing ranges. (Note also that this iterable could be a generator of a very long sequence --another reason to use reduce and not some operation on an in-memory collection).
from functools import reduce
def rle(a, b):
if a and a[-1][1] == b:
return a[:-1] + [(a[-1][0], b + 1)]
return a + [(b, b + 1)]
reduce(rle, [0, 1, 2, 5, 8, 9], [])
# [(0, 3), (5, 6), (8, 10)]
Notice the use of a proper initial value ([] here) for reduce.
Corner cases handled as well:
reduce(rle, [], [])
# []
reduce(rle, [0], [])
# [(0, 1)]

Well, first of all, your reduce_func doesn't have the structure of a fold; it doesn't match your description of a fold (which is correct).
The structure of a fold is: def foldl(func, start, iter): return func(start, foldl(func, next(iter), iter)
Now, your fact function doesn't operate on two elements - it just calculates factorial.
So, in sum, you're not using a fold, and with that definition of factorial, you don't need to.
If you do want to play around with factorial, check out the y-combinator: http://mvanier.livejournal.com/2897.html
If you want to learn about folds, look at my answer to this question, which demonstrates its use to calculate cumulative fractions: creating cumulative percentage from a dictionary of data

Reduce executes the function in parameter#1 successively through the values provided by the iterator in parameter#2
print '-------------- Example: Reduce(x + y) --------------'
def add(x,y): return x+y
x = 5
y = 10
import functools
tot = functools.reduce(add, range(5, 10))
print 'reduce('+str(x)+','+str(y)+')=' ,tot
def myreduce(a,b):
tot = 0
for i in range(a,b):
tot = tot+i
print i,tot
print 'myreduce('+str(a)+','+str(b)+')=' ,tot
myreduce(x,y)
print '-------------- Example: Reduce(x * y) --------------'
def add(x,y): return x*y
x = 5
y = 10
import functools
tot = functools.reduce(add, range(5, 10))
print 'reduce('+str(x)+','+str(y)+')=' ,tot
def myreduce(a,b):
tot = 1
for i in range(a,b):
tot = tot * i
print i,tot
print 'myreduce('+str(a)+','+str(b)+')=' ,tot
myreduce(x,y)