From: Sven Hartrumpf <xxxxxx@FernUni-Hagen.de>
Comparison predicates.
I saw the discussion about < and <=. But is not a three-valued comparison
function (symbols less, greater, equal) more efficient for some data types
if many duplicates are present? I often sort lists of some million strings
of average length 20 and many duplicates. I remember that some sort
algorithms will test (< a b) and (< b a) in certain constellations for one
setting of a and b. (Olin, for things like this a look at your reference
implementation would be helpful, although concentrating on the design was
a clever move for the discussion so far.) A three-valued comparison
function also speeds up vector-binary-search. A problem for three-valued
comparison functions is that their implementation can range from efficient
to inefficient:
- you can write an efficient string-compare for strings
- but, for numbers you would need support from the underlying Scheme system
beyond R5RS (?) although an implementation using > and < is not too slow.
OK, here's what I know about sorts that use three-way order predicates.
I only know of one sorting algorithm that can exploit this: it is a variant
of quicksort which I learned from Jon Bentley and was tagged to him and Doug
McIlroy. It is described in the comments at the end of the quicksort code
in my reference implementation; I append it for interested readers.
People with your needs deserve support from this SRFI. Now, we have two
basic approaches to putting a three-way-comparison sort into the SRFI:
- I could add it in the "general" sorting lib, perhaps
(vector-sort3! v compare [start end])
and so forth (possibly for stable, non-destructive, and list variants).
- I could just add it to the quicksort module
(quick-sort3! v compare [start end])
I do *not* think this function fits into the "general" category. For one,
I don't know of any *stable* variants, or list variants. I only know of
one, non-stable algorithm that works in-place on a vector. Period.
(I don't mean I don't know how to sort a list or stably sort a vector
using a three-way comparison function. After all, you could just use
your three-way comparison function in a "dumb" two-way < mode in any
of the standard algorithms. I mean I don't know of a way to do it that
*exploits* the extra discrimination provided by the three-way comparison.)
So unless there is a sorting honcho out there that can tell me three-way
comparison sorts come in a variety of functionalities (stable, in-place,
list, vector), it seems best to claim it's an *algorithm*, not a *general
operation* and file it that way: three-way in-place vector quick sort.
OK? If that's what you need, you pull it out of the quick-sort module.
Final remark: I think the comparison function f should return an integer:
(f x y) < 0 x < y
(f x y) = 0 x = y
(f x y) > 0 x > y
I prefer this to having it return a symbol, e.g. {'less, 'equal, 'greater}.
Why? First, the integer is frequently the natural result of the actual
comparison operation, e.g. consider the trivial comparison function -.
In fact, keeping in mind that - is the "model" for this comparison function
is a nice, simple, easy-to-remember way to decide "polarity," that is,
if a negative number means x < y or y < x.
Second, integers can be tested by the underlying hardware against zero
quickly. Using symbols is more expensive.
In summary, I propose adding
(quick-sort3! v compare [start end]) -> unspecified
to the vector quick-sort module. COMPARE returns an integer.
I'm not even going to add a non-in-place version.
The current quick-sort code from the ref implementation follows; see the
comments at the end. They will have to be turned into code.
That's my story on three-way comparison sorting. Comments?
-Olin
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
;;; The SRFI-32 sort package -- quick sort -*- Scheme -*-
;;; Copyright (c) 1998 by Olin Shivers.
;;; This code is open-source; see the end of the file for porting and
;;; more copyright information.
;;; Olin Shivers 10/98.
;;; Exports:
;;; (quick-sort v < [start end]) -> vector
;;; (quick-sort! v < [start end]) -> unspecific
;;; This quicksort is at least somewhat non-naive -- it uses the median of
;;; three elements as the partition pivot, so pathological n^2 run time is
;;; much rarer (but not eliminated completely). If you really wanted to get
;;; fancy, you could use a random number generator to choose pivots. The key
;;; to this trick is that you only need to pick one random number for each
;;; *level* of recursion -- i.e. you only need (lg n) random numbers. See the
;;; end of the file for a further trick, which I learned from Jon Bentley,
;;; for exploiting ordering procedures that discriminate 3 ways (<, =, >)
;;; to partition each subvector into 3 regions.
(define (quick-sort! v < . maybe-start+end)
(let-vector-start+end (start end) quick-sort! v maybe-start+end
(%quick-sort! v < start end)))
(define (quick-sort v < . maybe-start+end)
(let-vector-start+end (start end) quick-sort v maybe-start+end
(let ((ans (vector-copy v start end)))
(%quick-sort! ans < 0 (- end start))
ans)))
;;; %QUICK-SORT! is not exported.
;;; Preconditions:
;;; V vector
;;; START END fixnums
;;; 0 <= START, END <= (vector-length V)
;;; If these preconditions are ensured by the cover functions, you
;;; can safely change this code to use unsafe fixnum arithmetic and vector
;;; indexing ops, for *huge* speedup.
;;;
;;; We bail out to insertion sort for small ranges; feel free to tune the
;;; crossover -- it's just a random guess. If you don't have the insertion
;;; sort routine, just kill that branch of the IF and change the recursion
;;; test to (< 1 (- r l)) -- the code is set up to work that way.
(define (%quick-sort! v elt< start end)
(let recur ((l start) (r end)) ; Sort the range [l,r).
(if (< 5 (- r l))
;; Choose the median of V[l], V[r], and V[middle] for the pivot.
(let* ((median (lambda (v1 v2 v3)
(receive (little big)
(if (elt< v1 v2) (values v1 v2) (values v2 v1))
(if (elt< big v3) big
(if (elt< little v3) v3 little)))))
(pivot (median (vector-ref v l)
(vector-ref v (quotient (+ l r) 2))
(vector-ref v (- r 1)))))
(let loop ((i l) (j (- r 1)))
(let ((i (let scan ((i i)) (if (elt< (vector-ref v i) pivot)
(scan (+ i 1))
i)))
(j (let scan ((j j)) (if (elt< pivot (vector-ref v j))
(scan (- j 1))
j))))
(if (< i j)
(let ((tmp (vector-ref v j)))
(vector-set! v j (vector-ref v i)) ; Swap V[I]
(vector-set! v i tmp) ; and V[J].
(loop (+ i 1) (- j 1)))
(begin (recur l i) (recur (+ j 1) r))))))
;; Small segment => punt to insert sort.
;; Use the dangerous subprimitive.
;; NOTE: It can happen that (< r l), which means an empty range.
;; If %INSERT-SORT! didn't tolerate such a degenerate range, we'd
;; have to check for this case.
(%insert-sort! v elt< l r)
)))
;;; Note: If you're ambitious, you might consider a variant of this quicksort
;;; routine. If you have a comparison routine that returns *three*
;;; indicators -- <, =, or > -- then the partition code can partition the
;;; vector into a left part that is <, a middle region that is =, and a right
;;; part that is > the pivot. Here's how it is done:
;;; The partition loop divides the range being partitioned into five
;;; subranges:
;;; =======<<<<<<<<<?????????>>>>>>>=======
;;; where = marks a value that is = to the pivot, < marks a value that is
;;; less than the pivot, ? marks a value that hasn't been scanned, and
;;; > marks a value that is greater than the pivot. Let's consider the
;;; rightward scan. If it checks a ? value that is <, it keeps scanning.
;;; If the ? value is >, we stop the scan -- we are ready to start the
;;; leftward scan and then do a swap. But if the rightward scan checks a
;;; ? value that is =, we swap it *down* to the end of the initial chunk
;;; of ====='s -- we exchange it with the leftmost < value -- and then
;;; continue our rightward scan. The leftwards scan works in a similar
;;; fashion, scanning past > elements, stopping on a < element, and swapping
;;; up = elements. When we are done, we have a picture like this
;;; ========<<<<<<<<<<<<>>>>>>>>>>=========
;;; Then swap the = elements up into the middle of the vector to get
;;; this:
;;; <<<<<<<<<<<<=================>>>>>>>>>>
;;; Then recurse on the <'s and >'s. Working out all the tricky little
;;; boundary cases I leave an exercise to the interested reader.
;;; -Olin
;;; Copyright
;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;
;;; This code is
;;; Copyright (c) 1998 by Olin Shivers.
;;; The terms are: You may do as you please with this code, as long as
;;; you do not delete this notice or hold me responsible for any outcome
;;; related to its use.
;;;
;;; Blah blah blah.
;;; Code tuning & porting
;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;
;;; This is very portable code. It's R4RS with the following exceptions:
;;; - VECTOR-COPY
;;; - The scsh LET-VECTOR-START+END macro for parsing and defaulting optional
;;; START/END arguments.
;;; - The R5RS multiple-value VALUES procedure and the simple RECEIVE
;;; multiple value-binding macro.
;;; - The quicksort recursion bottoms out in a call to an insertion sort
;;; routine, %INSERT-SORT!. But you could even punt this and go with pure
;;; recursion in a pinch.
;;;
;;; This code is *tightly* bummed as far as I can go in portable Scheme.
;;;
;;; The internal primitive %QUICK-SORT! that does the real work can be
;;; converted to use unsafe vector-indexing and fixnum-specific arithmetic ops
;;; *if* you alter the two small cover functions to enforce the invariants.
;;; This should provide *big* speedups. In fact, all the code bumming I've
;;; done pretty much disappears in the noise unless you have a good compiler
;;; and also can dump the vector-index checks and generic arithmetic -- so
;;; I've really just set things up for you to exploit.
;;;
;;; The optional-arg parsing, defaulting, and error checking is done with a
;;; portable R4RS macro. But if your Scheme has a faster mechanism (e.g.,
;;; Chez), you should definitely port over to it. Note that argument defaulting
;;; and error-checking are interleaved -- you don't have to error-check
;;; defaulted START/END args to see if they are fixnums that are legal vector
;;; indices for the corresponding vector, etc.
