Issue regarding quicksort (java) [closed] - java

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Closed 10 years ago.
I'm trying to implement several different types of quicksort in java, but none of my implementations seem to be working. I've looked all over the internet and my code looks very similar to all the code that i've found, so I have no idea whats wrong. My code is as follows: (Note that this isn't complete but I figure if I find whats wrong with one quicksort, the other versions will work as well) Edit: The problem i'm having is that the array doesn't sort correctly. I run a simple method called isSorted to tell me whether the array was sorted correctly. It works with other sorting methods (insertion sort, heap sort etc.) but reports false when used with my implementation of quicksort
public static void quickSort(int[] A) {
flag=0;
quickSortHelper(A, 0, A.length-1);
}
public static void quickSortHelper(int [] A, int low, int high){
if(low<high){
if(flag==0){
int q=DPartition(A, low,high,A[high]);
quickSortHelper(A,low,q-1);
quickSortHelper(A,q+1,high);
}
public static int DPartition(int [] A, int low, int high,int pivot){
int p=pivot;
int i=low;
int j=high-1;
while (i<=j){
while(i<=j && A[i]<=p){
i=i+1;
}
while(j>=i && A[j]>=p){
j=j-1;
}
if (i<j){
int temp = A[i];
A[i] = A[j];
A[j] = temp;
}
}
int temp = A[i];
A[i] = A[p];
A[p] = temp;
return i;
}

The bug is in your DPartition method. In quick sort, you move in a particular direction, and as soon as swapping is performed, you change the direction you move. But, in the above code, you are moving in both the direction without swapping.
The first inner-while loop finds the location of swap, but instead of swapping, you started with the next inner-while, which starts moving in opposite direction. That is faulty.
You should maintain one more variable to store the direction in the array.
You can try modifying your code like this (Not Tested): -
// No need to pass `pivot` as parameter. Just use `high`.
public static int DPartition(int [] A, int low, int high) {
int i=low;
int j=high;
boolean leftToRight = false;
boolean rightToLeft = true;
while (i <= j) { // Iterate till middle
if (leftToRight) { // Move left to right
while(i <= j && A[i] <= A[j]){
i=i+1; // Move right until condition is satisfied
}
if (i < j) { // If `i` has not moved beyond `j`. Perform Swap
swap(i, j, A); // Pass index for swapping along with array.
}
leftToRight = false; // Toggle to change direction.
rightToLeft = true;
} else if (rightToLeft) { // Move right to left.
while(j >= i && A[j] >= A[i]){
j=j-1;
}
if (j > i) { // If j has not moved beyond `i`. Perform Swap
swap(i, j, A);
}
rightToLeft = false; // Toggle to change the direction
leftToRight = true;
}
}
return i; // Return `index` to split.
}
public static void swap(int p, int q, int[] a) {
System.out.println("p = " + p + ", q = " + q);
int temp = a[p];
a[p] = a[q];
a[q] = temp;
}

Related

Quicksort infinite loop in Java

I am trying to implement the quicksort algorithm in Java. The following code is identicall to the one provided by my university professor. It works just fine, until I set as an input the Object[] {1,2,3,14,24,5,454,1,24,2,11} (obviously left = 0 and right = 10). The algorithm seems to fall into an infinite loop, but I cannot find where or why. I have been looking at it for a few days now and i cannot find the bug. I studied other similar problems with the quicksort algorithms on the site, but they did not help in fixing my problem. I would apreciate any ideas.
static int partition (Object[] a, int left, int right, Comparator c){
Object pivot = a[left];
int i = left+1;
int j = right;
while (i<=j){
while(i<=j && c.less(a[i],pivot)){i++;}
while(c.less(pivot, a[j])){j--;}
if (i<j){
Object temp = a[i];
a[i]=a[j];
a[j]=temp;
i++;
j--;
}
}
a[left] = a[j];
a[j] = pivot;
return j;
}
static void quickSort(Object[] a, int left, int right){
if(left<right){
int p = partition(a,left,right, new Comparator());
quickSort(a,left,p-1);
quickSort(a,p+1,right);
}
}
Just to mark it as accepted answer, as markspace pointed out in the comments, the infinite loop occures when i == j. The two while loops fail as well as the if statement so they are left unchanged. Changing the main loop to while (i < j) fixxed the issue. Thank you, markspace, for your help!

Inplace Quicksort in Java

For refreshing some Java I tried to implement a quicksort (inplace) algorithm that can sort integer arrays. Following is the code I've got so far. You can call it by sort(a,0,a.length-1).
This code obviously fails (gets into an infinite loop) if both 'pointers' i,j point each to an array entry that have the same values as the pivot. The pivot element v is always the right most of the current partition (the one with the greatest index).
But I just cannot figure out how to avoid that, does anyone see a solution?
static void sort(int a[], int left, int right) {
if (right > left){
int i=left, j=right-1, tmp;
int v = a[right]; //pivot
int counter = 0;
do {
while(a[i]<v)i++;
while(j>0 && a[j]>v)j--;
if( i < j){
tmp = a[i];
a[i] = a[j];
a[j] = tmp;
}
} while(i < j);
tmp = a[right];
a[right] = a[i];
a[i] = tmp;
sort(a,left,i-1);
sort(a,i+1,right);
}
}
When preforming a Quicksort I strongly suggest making a separate method for partitioning to make the code easier to follow (I'll show an example below). On top of this a good way of avoiding worst case run time is shuffling the array you're sorting prior to preforming the quick sort. Also I used the first index as the partitioning item instead of the last.
For example:
public static void sort (int[] a)
{
StdRandom.shuffle(a);
sort(a, 0, a.length - 1);
}
private static void sort(int[] a, int lo, int hi)
{
if (hi <= lo) return;
int j = partition(a, lo, hi) // the addition of a partitioning method
sort(a, lo, j-1);
sort(a, j+1, hi);
}
private static int partition(int[] a, int lo, int hi)
{
int i = lo, j = hi + 1, tmp = 0;
int v = a[lo];
while (true)
{
while (a[i++] < v) if (i == hi) break;
while (v < a[j--]) if (j == lo) break;
if (i >= j) break;
tmp = a[i];
a[i] = a[j];
a[j] = tmp;
}
tmp = a[lo];
a[lo] = a[j];
a[j] = temp;
return j;
}
On top of this if you want a really good example on how Quicksort works (as a refresher) see here.
This should work (will check for correctness in a bit, it works!):
EDIT: I previously made a mistake in error checking. I forgot to add 2 more conditions, here is the amended code.
public static void main (String[] args) throws java.lang.Exception
{
int b[] = {10, 9, 8, 7, 7, 7, 7, 3, 2, 1};
sort(b,0,b.length-1);
System.out.println(Arrays.toString(b));
}
static void sort(int a[], int left, int right) {
if (right > left){
int i=left, j=right, tmp;
//we want j to be right, not right-1 since that leaves out a number during recursion
int v = a[right]; //pivot
do {
while(a[i]<v)
i++;
while(a[j]>v)
//no need to check for 0, the right condition for recursion is the 2 if statements below.
j--;
if( i <= j){ //your code was i<j
tmp = a[i];
a[i] = a[j];
a[j] = tmp;
i++;
j--;
//we need to +/- both i,j, else it will stick at 0 or be same number
}
} while(i <= j); //your code was i<j, hence infinite loop on 0 case
//you had a swap here, I don't think it's needed.
//this is the 2 conditions we need to avoid infinite loops
// check if left < j, if it isn't, it's already sorted. Done
if(left < j) sort(a,left,j);
//check if i is less than right, if it isn't it's already sorted. Done
// here i is now the 'middle index', the slice for divide and conquer.
if(i < right) sort(a,i,right);
}
}
This Code in the IDEOne online compiler
Basically we make sure that we also swap the value if the value of i/j is the same as the pivot, and break out of the recursion.
Also there was a check in the pseudocode for the length, as if we have an array of just 1 item it's already sorted (we forgot the base case), I thought we needed that but since you pass in the indexes and the entire array, not the subarray, we just increment i and j so the algorithm won't stick at 0 (they're done sorting) but still keep sorting an array of 1. :)
Also, we had to add 2 conditions to check if the array is already sorted for the recursive calls. without it, we'll end up sorting an already sorted array forever, hence another infinite loop. see how I added checks for if left less than j and if i less than right. Also, at that point of passing in i and j, i is effectively the middle index we split for divide and conquer, and j would be the value right before the middle value.
The pseudocode for it is taken from RosettaCode:
function quicksort(array)
if length(array) > 1
pivot := select any element of array
left := first index of array
right := last index of array
while left ≤ right
while array[left] < pivot
left := left + 1
while array[right] > pivot
right := right - 1
if left ≤ right
swap array[left] with array[right]
left := left + 1
right := right - 1
quicksort(array from first index to right)
quicksort(array from left to last index)
Reference: This SO question
Also read this for a quick refresher, it's implemented differently with an oridnary while loop
This was fun :)
Heres some simple code I wrote that doesn't initialize to many pointers and gets the job done in a simple manner.
public int[] quickSort(int[] x ){
quickSortWorker(x,0,x.length-1);
return x;
}
private int[] quickSortWorker(int[] x, int lb, int ub){
if (lb>=ub) return x;
int pivotIndex = lb;
for (int i = lb+1 ; i<=ub; i++){
if (x[i]<=x[pivotIndex]){
swap(x,pivotIndex,i);
swap(x,i,pivotIndex+1);
pivotIndex++;
}
}
quickSortWorker(x,lb,pivotIndex-1);
quickSortWorker(x,pivotIndex+1,ub);
return x;
}
private void swap(int[] x,int a, int b){
int tmp = x[a];
x[a]=x[b];
x[b]=tmp;
}

I'm trying to implement merge sort but the output i get is the same array

I'm trying to implement merge sort but the output i get is the same array.this merge sort gives me the same output as input.plz help.i'm pretty sure the implementation is correct and i tried debugging it but couldnt figure out the mistake.
Solved: i was comparing helper[left] to helper[mid] instead of helper right. Thanks for the help people.
public class Sort {
public static void main(String[] args){
int arr[] = {3,5,6,9,0,2,4};
Sort sort = new Sort();
int i=0;
sort.MergeSort(arr);
for(i=0;i<arr.length;i++){
System.out.print(arr[i]);
}
}
private void MergeSort(int[] arr2) {
// TODO Auto-generated method stub
int helper[] = new int[arr2.length];
MergeSort(arr2,helper,0,arr2.length-1);
}
private void MergeSort(int[] arr2,int[] helper,int start, int end) {
if(start<end){
int mid = (start+end)/2;
MergeSort(arr2,helper,start,mid);
MergeSort(arr2,helper,mid+1,end);
Merge(arr2,helper,start,mid,end);
}else{
//do nothing
}
}
private void Merge(int[] arr2, int[] helper, int start, int mid, int end) {
// TODO Auto-generated method stub
int i;
for(i=start;i<=end;i++){
helper[i]=arr2[i];
}
i=start;
int left = start;
int right = mid+1;
while(left <= mid && right <= end){
if(helper[left] <= helper[mid]){
arr2[i] = helper[left];
left++;
}else{
arr2[i] = helper[right];
right++;
}
i++;
}
//move remaining of left to array
int remaining = mid-left;
int j;
for(j=0;j<=remaining;j++){
arr2[i+j]=helper[left+j];
}
}
}
Tricky one... :-)
you are always comparing the element at leftto the element at mid instead of the element at right:
while(left <= mid && right <= end){
if(helper[left] <= helper[mid]){
should be
while(left <= mid && right <= end){
if(helper[left] <= helper[right]){
Optional, but more clear:
Besides as Matt mentioned you are missing to catch up remaining values from the right arm
while (left <= mid)
arr2[i++] = helper[left++];
while (right <= end) {
arr2[i++] = helper[right++];
Edit: Mark right arm catchup as optional
I think it's that your merge() function is missing a certain case.
//move remaining of left to array
int remaining = mid-left;
int j;
for(j=0;j<=remaining;j++){
arr2[i+j]=helper[left+j];
}
takes care of if the right sub-array was exhausted first, but does not consider the case if the left sub array was exhausted first (which may lead to some unusual results). I know this wasn't quite what you were trying to ask and I will keep looking at your code to see if I can help.
Happy Coding! Leave a comment if you have any questions.

Quick Sort using first element as pivot [closed]

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Edit the question to include desired behavior, a specific problem or error, and the shortest code necessary to reproduce the problem. This will help others answer the question.
Closed 8 years ago.
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I implemented Quick Sort by choosing the first element as pivot. it works fine for general test cases but consider a case when the array is reverse sorted for instance 5 4 3 2 1. I understand where it is throwing a runtime error. but I cant fix it correctly. Is the implementation for first element as pivot correct? Please suggest modifications.
public static void quicksort(int low,int high)
{
if(low<high)
{
int temp=0;
int pivot=a[low];
int large_index=low+1;
int small_index=high;
while(large_index<=small_index)
{
while(a[small_index]>pivot)
small_index--;
while(a[large_index]<pivot)
large_index++;
if(large_index<=small_index)
{
temp = a[large_index];
a[large_index]= a[small_index];
a[small_index]= temp;
large_index++;
small_index--;
}
}
temp = a[small_index];
a[small_index]= a[low];
a[low]= temp;
quicksort(low,small_index-1);
quicksort(small_index+1,high);
}
}
There were multiple flaws:
a) Unnecessary swapping outside the loop
temp = a[small_index]; a[small_index]= a[low]; a[low]= temp;
b) The improper initialization of large_index.
c) Calling the recursive function without checking the values of
small_index and large_index.
I have rectified them,
now the function will look like:
if (low < high) {
int temp = 0;
int pivot = a[low];
int large_index = low;
int small_index = high;
while (large_index <= small_index) {
while (a[small_index] > pivot)
small_index--;
while (a[large_index] < pivot)
large_index++;
if (large_index <= small_index) {
temp = a[large_index];
a[large_index] = a[small_index];
a[small_index] = temp;
large_index++;
small_index--;
}
}
if(low < small_index)
{
quicksort(low, small_index);
}
if(large_index < high)
{
quicksort(large_index, high);
}
}
Now, watching the variables in your piece of code: (your code will fail in the final iteration of any given input unless the input is not sorted)
Consider the input 2,1
1st iteration:
pivot = 2
large_index = 1;
small_index = 1;
while1:
1<=1 -> true
while2: 1>2 false.
while3: 1<2 true. -> large_index++
2nd time in while loop large_index =2 which is > the size of a.
Resulting in IndexArrayOutOfBounds.
Which shows that your initialization of large_index was wrong.
It should have been: large_index = low; instead of low+1;
Hope this helps.
The following loop continues on above high, when large_index already starts above the pivot and it happens that the pivot is larger than every element located after it:
while(a[large_index]<pivot)
large_index++;
There might be other bugs, of course.
After some attempts I was able to make the Quicksort function and it works fine now. #BatScream I have still used the small_index=low+1 in my code. So that was not a mistake I guess. And the original Quick Sort algorithm follows this mechanism. For reference please watch the lecture on QuickSort by Princeton Professor Robert Sedgewick.Please remind if there is a flaw to the edited Quick Sort Algorithm.
public static void quicksort(int low,int high)
{
if(low<high)
{
int temp=0;
int pivot=a[low];
int large_index=low+1;
int small_index=high;
while(large_index<small_index)
{
while(a[large_index]<pivot) {
if(large_index==high)
break;
large_index++;
}
while(a[small_index]>pivot)
{
if(small_index==low)
break;
small_index--;
}
if(large_index<small_index) {
temp = a[large_index];
a[large_index]= a[small_index];
a[small_index]= temp;
large_index++;
small_index--;
}
}
if(a[small_index]<pivot) {
temp = a[small_index];
a[small_index]= a[low];
a[low]= temp;
}
if(low<small_index) //Recursively sort the left half.
{
quicksort(low,small_index-1);
}
if(high>small_index) //Recursively sort the right half.
{
quicksort(small_index+1,high);
}
}
}

How to find the median of a large number of integers (they dont fit in memory)

I know the answer is using median of medians but can someone explain how to do it?
There are linear time algorithms to do this, this page might be helpful, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selection_algorithm, if you are still confused just ask
Basically the way the selection algorithm works is like a quicksort but it only sorts on side of the pivot each time. The goal is to keep partitioning until you choose the pivot equal to the index of the element you were trying to find. Here is java code I found for quickselect:
public static int selectKth(int[] arr, int k) {
if (arr == null || arr.length <= k)
throw new Error();
int from = 0, to = arr.length - 1;
// if from == to we reached the kth element
while (from < to) {
int r = from, w = to;
int mid = arr[(r + w) / 2];
// stop if the reader and writer meets
while (r < w) {
if (arr[r] >= mid) { // put the large values at the end
int tmp = arr[w];
arr[w] = arr[r];
arr[r] = tmp;
w--;
} else { // the value is smaller than the pivot, skip
r++;
}
}
// if we stepped up (r++) we need to step one down
if (arr[r] > mid)
r--;
// the r pointer is on the end of the first k elements
if (k <= r) {
to = r;
} else {
from = r + 1;
}
}
return arr[k];
}
here is the Median of Medians algorithm. check this out
See the first two answers to this question. If the first one (frequency counts) can work for your data / available storage, you can get the exact answer that way. The second (remedian) is a robust, general method.

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