On Page 140 of Programming Pearls, 2nd Edition, Jon proposed an implementation of sets with bit vectors.
We'll turn now to two final structures that exploit the fact that our sets represent integers. Bit vectors are an old friend from Column 1. Here are their private data and functions:
enum { BITSPERWORD = 32, SHIFT = 5, MASK = 0x1F };
int n, hi, *x;
void set(int i) { x[i>>SHIFT] |= (1<<(i & MASK)); }
void clr(int i) { x[i>>SHIFT] &= ~(1<<(i & MASK)); }
int test(int i) { return x[i>>SHIFT] &= (1<<(i & MASK)); }
As I gathered, the central idea of a bit vector to represent an integer set, as described in Column 1, is that the i-th bit is turned on if and only if the integer i is in the set.
But I am really at a loss at the algorithms involved in the above three functions. And the book doesn't give an explanation.
I can only get that i & MASK is to get the lower 5 bits of i, while i>>SHIFT is to move i 5 bits toward the right.
Anybody would elaborate more on these algorithms? Bit operations always seem a myth to me, :(
Bit Fields and You
I'll use a simple example to explain the basics. Say you have an unsigned integer with four bits:
[0][0][0][0] = 0
You can represent any number here from 0 to 15 by converting it to base 2. Say we have the right end be the smallest:
[0][1][0][1] = 5
So the first bit adds 1 to the total, the second adds 2, the third adds 4, and the fourth adds 8. For example, here's 8:
[1][0][0][0] = 8
So What?
Say you want to represent a binary state in an application-- if some option is enabled, if you should draw some element, and so on. You probably don't want to use an entire integer for each one of these- it'd be using a 32 bit integer to store one bit of information. Or, to continue our example in four bits:
[0][0][0][1] = 1 = ON
[0][0][0][0] = 0 = OFF //what a huge waste of space!
(Of course, the problem is more pronounced in real life since 32-bit integers look like this:
[0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0] = 0
The answer to this is to use a bit field. We have a collection of properties (usually related ones) which we will flip on and off using bit operations. So, say, you might have 4 different lights on a piece of hardware that you want to be on or off.
3 2 1 0
[0][0][0][0] = 0
(Why do we start with light 0? I'll explain this in a second.)
Note that this is an integer, and is stored as an integer, but is used to represent multiple states for multiple objects. Crazy! Say we turn lights 2 and 1 on:
3 2 1 0
[0][1][1][0] = 6
The important thing you should note here: There's probably no obvious reason why lights 2 and 1 being on should equal six, and it may not be obvious how we would do anything with this scheme of information storage. It doesn't look more obvious if you add more bits:
3 2 1 0
[1][1][1][0] = 0xE \\what?
Why do we care about this? Do we have exactly one state for each number between 0 and 15?How are we going to manage this without some insane series of switch statements? Ugh...
The Light at the End
So if you've worked with binary arithmetic a bit before, you might realize that the relationship between the numbers on the left and the numbers on the right is, of course, base 2. That is:
1*(23) + 1*(22) + 1*(21) +0 *(20) = 0xE
So each light is present in the exponent of each term of the equation. If the light is on, there is a 1 next to its term- if the light is off, there is a zero. Take the time to convince yourself that there is exactly one integer between 0 and 15 that corresponds to each state in this numbering scheme.
Bit operators
Now that we have this done, let's take a second to see what bitshifting does to integers in this setup.
[0][0][0][1] = 1
When you shift bits to the left or the right in an integer, it literally moves the bits left and right. (Note: I 100% disavow this explanation for negative numbers! There be dragons!)
1<<2 = 4
[0][1][0][0] = 4
4>>1 = 2
[0][0][1][0] = 2
You will encounter similar behavior when shifting numbers represented with more than one bit. Also, it shouldn't be hard to convince yourself that x>>0 or x<<0 is just x. Doesn't shift anywhere.
This probably explains the naming scheme of the Shift operators to anyone who wasn't familiar with them.
Bitwise operations
This representation of numbers in binary can also be used to shed some light on the operations of bitwise operators on integers. Each bit in the first number is xor-ed, and-ed, or or-ed with its fellow number. Take a second to venture to wikipedia and familiarize yourself with the function of these Boolean operators - I'll explain how they function on numbers but I don't want to rehash the general idea in great detail.
...
Welcome back! Let's start by examining the effect of the OR (|) operator on two integers, stored in four bit.
OR OPERATOR ON:
[1][0][0][1] = 0x9
[1][1][0][0] = 0xC
________________
[1][1][0][1] = 0xD
Tough! This is a close analogue to the truth table for the boolean OR operator. Notice that each column ignores the adjacent columns and simply fills in the result column with the result of the first bit and the second bit OR'd together. Note also that the value of anything or'd with 1 is 1 in that particular column. Anything or'd with zero remains the same.
The table for AND (&) is interesting, though somewhat inverted:
AND OPERATOR ON:
[1][0][0][1] = 0x9
[1][1][0][0] = 0xC
________________
[1][0][0][0] = 0x8
In this case we do the same thing- we perform the AND operation with each bit in a column and put the result in that bit. No column cares about any other column.
Important lesson about this, which I invite you to verify by using the diagram above: anything AND-ed with zero is zero. Also, equally important- nothing happens to numbers that are AND-ed with one. They stay the same.
The final table, XOR, has behavior which I hope you all find predictable by now.
XOR OPERATOR ON:
[1][0][0][1] = 0x9
[1][1][0][0] = 0xC
________________
[0][1][0][1] = 0x5
Each bit is being XOR'd with its column, yadda yadda, and so on. But look closely at the first row and the second row. Which bits changed? (Half of them.) Which bits stayed the same? (No points for answering this one.)
The bit in the first row is being changed in the result if (and only if) the bit in the second row is 1!
The one lightbulb example!
So now we have an interesting set of tools we can use to flip individual bits. Let's go back to the lightbulb example and focus only on the first lightbulb.
0
[?] \\We don't know if it's one or zero while coding
We know that we have an operation that can always make this bit equal to one- the OR 1 operator.
0|1 = 1
1|1 = 1
So, ignoring the rest of the bulbs, we could do this
4_bit_lightbulb_integer |= 1;
and know for sure that we did nothing but set the first lightbulb to ON.
3 2 1 0
[0][0][0][?] = 0 or 1? \\4_bit_lightbulb_integer
[0][0][0][1] = 1
________________
[0][0][0][1] = 0x1
Similarly, we can AND the number with zero. Well- not quite zero- we don't want to affect the state of the other bits, so we will fill them in with ones.
I'll use the unary (one-argument) operator for bit negation. The ~ (NOT) bitwise operator flips all of the bits in its argument. ~(0X1):
[0][0][0][1] = 0x1
________________
[1][1][1][0] = 0xE
We will use this in conjunction with the AND bit below.
Let's do 4_bit_lightbulb_integer & 0xE
3 2 1 0
[0][1][0][?] = 4 or 5? \\4_bit_lightbulb_integer
[1][1][1][0] = 0xE
________________
[0][1][0][0] = 0x4
We're seeing a lot of integers on the right-hand-side which don't have any immediate relevance. You should get used to this if you deal with bit fields a lot. Look at the left-hand side. The bit on the right is always zero and the other bits are unchanged. We can turn off light 0 and ignore everything else!
Finally, you can use the XOR bit to flip the first bit selectively!
3 2 1 0
[0][1][0][?] = 4 or 5? \\4_bit_lightbulb_integer
[0][0][0][1] = 0x1
________________
[0][1][0][*] = 4 or 5?
We don't actually know what the value of * is now- just that flipped from whatever ? was.
Combining Bit Shifting and Bitwise operations
The interesting fact about these two operations is when taken together they allow you to manipulate selective bits.
[0][0][0][1] = 1 = 1<<0
[0][0][1][0] = 2 = 1<<1
[0][1][0][0] = 4 = 1<<2
[1][0][0][0] = 8 = 1<<3
Hmm. Interesting. I'll mention the negation operator here (~) as it's used in a similar way to produce the needed bit values for ANDing stuff in bit fields.
[1][1][1][0] = 0xE = ~(1<<0)
[1][1][0][1] = 0xD = ~(1<<1)
[1][0][1][1] = 0xB = ~(1<<2)
[0][1][1][1] = 0X7 = ~(1<<3)
Are you seeing an interesting relationship between the shift value and the corresponding lightbulb position of the shifted bit?
The canonical bitshift operators
As alluded to above, we have an interesting, generic method for turning on and off specific lights with the bit-shifters above.
To turn on a bulb, we generate the 1 in the right position using bit shifting, and then OR it with the current lightbulb positions. Say we want to turn on light 3, and ignore everything else. We need to get a bit shifting operation that ORs
3 2 1 0
[?][?][?][?] \\all we know about these values at compile time is where they are!
and 0x8
[1][0][0][0] = 0x8
Which is easy, thanks to bitshifting! We'll pick the number of the light and switch the value over:
1<<3 = 0x8
and then:
4_bit_lightbulb_integer |= 0x8;
3 2 1 0
[1][?][?][?] \\the ? marks have not changed!
And we can guarantee that the bit for the 3rd lightbulb is set to 1 and that nothing else has changed.
Clearing a bit works similarly- we'll use the negated bits table above to, say, clear light 2.
~(1<<2) = 0xB = [1][0][1][1]
4_bit_lightbulb_integer & 0xB:
3 2 1 0
[?][?][?][?]
[1][0][1][1]
____________
[?][0][?][?]
The XOR method of flipping bits is the same idea as the OR one.
So the canonical methods of bit switching are this:
Turn on the light i:
4_bit_lightbulb_integer|=(1<<i)
Turn off light i:
4_bit_lightbulb_integer&=~(1<<i)
Flip light i:
4_bit_lightbulb_integer^=(1<<i)
Wait, how do I read these?
In order to check a bit we can simply zero out all of the bits except for the one we care about. We'll then check to see if the resulting value is greater than zero- since this is the only value that could possibly be nonzero, it will make the entire integer nonzero if and only if it is nonzero. For example, to check bit 2:
1<<2:
[0][1][0][0]
4_bit_lightbulb_integer:
[?][?][?][?]
1<<2 & 4_bit_lightbulb_integer:
[0][?][0][0]
Remember from the previous examples that the value of ? didn't change. Remember also that anything AND 0 is 0. So, we can say for sure that if this value is greater than zero, the switch at position 2 is true and the lightbulb is zero. Similarly, if the value is off, the value of the entire thing will be zero.
(You can alternately shift the entire value of 4_bit_lightbulb_integer over by i bits and AND it with 1. I don't remember off the top of my head if one is faster than the other but I doubt it.)
So the canonical checking function:
Check if bit i is on:
if (4_bit_lightbulb_integer & 1<<i) {
\\do whatever
}
The specifics
Now that we have a complete set of tools for bitwise operations, we can look at the specific example here. This is basically the same idea- except a much more concise and powerful way of executing it. Let's look at this function:
void set(int i) { x[i>>SHIFT] |= (1<<(i & MASK)); }
From the canonical implementation I'm going to make a guess that this is trying to set some bits to 1! Let's take an integer and look at what's going on here if i feed the value 0x32 (50 in decimal) into i:
x[0x32>>5] |= (1<<(0x32 & 0x1f))
Well, that's a mess.. let's dissect this operation on the right. For convenience, pretend there are 24 more irrelevant zeros, since these are both 32 bit integers.
...[0][0][0][1][1][1][1][1] = 0x1F
...[0][0][1][1][0][0][1][0] = 0x32
________________________
...[0][0][0][1][0][0][1][0] = 0x12
It looks like everything is being cut off at the boundary on top where 1s turn into zeros. This technique is called Bit Masking. Interestingly, the boundary here restricts the resulting values to be between 0 and 31... Which is exactly the number of bit positions we have for a 32 bit integer!
x[0x32>>5] |= (1<<(0x12))
Let's look at the other half.
...[0][0][1][1][0][0][1][0] = 0x32
Shift five bits to the right:
...[0][0][0][0][0][0][0][1] = 0x01
Note that this transformation exactly destroyed all information from the first part of the function- we have 32-5 = 27 remaining bits which could be nonzero. This indicates which of 227 integers in the array of integers are selected. So the simplified equation is now:
x[1] |= (1<<0x12)
This just looks like the canonical bit-setting operation! We've just chosen
So the idea is to use the first 27 bits to pick an integer to shift and the last five bits indicate which bit of the 32 in that integer to shift.
The key to understanding what's going on is to recognize that BITSPERWORD = 2SHIFT. Thus, x[i>>SHIFT] finds which 32-bit element of the array x has the bit corresponding to i. (By shifting i 5 bits to the right, you're simply dividing by 32.) Once you have located the correct element of x, the lower 5 bits of i can then be used to find which particular bit of x[i>>SHIFT] corresponds to i. That's what i & MASK does; by shifting 1 by that number of bits, you move the bit corresponding to 1 to the exact position within x[i>>SHIFT] that corresponds to the ith bit in x.
Here's a bit more of an explanation:
Imagine that we want capacity for N bits in our bit vector. Since each int holds 32 bits, we will need (N + 31) / 32 int values for our storage (that is, N/32 rounded up). Within each int value, we will adopt the convention that bits are ordered from least significant to most significant. We will also adopt the convention that the first 32 bits of our vector are in x[0], the next 32 bits are in x[1], and so forth. Here's the memory layout we are using (showing the bit index in our bit vector corresponding to each bit of memory):
+----+----+-------+----+----+----+
x[0]: | 31 | 30 | . . . | 02 | 01 | 00 |
+----+----+-------+----+----+----+
x[1]: | 63 | 62 | . . . | 34 | 33 | 32 |
+----+----+-------+----+----+----+
etc.
Our first step is to allocate the necessary storage capacity:
x = new int[(N + BITSPERWORD - 1) >> SHIFT]
(We could make provision for dynamically expanding this storage, but that would just add complexity to the explanation.)
Now suppose we want to access bit i (either to set it, clear it, or just to know its current value). We need to first figure out which element of x to use. Since there are 32 bits per int value, this is easy:
subscript for x = i / 32
Making use of the enum constants, the x element we want is:
x[i >> SHIFT]
(Think of this as a 32-bit-wide window into our N-bit vector.) Now we have to find the specific bit corresponding to i. Looking at the memory layout, it's not hard to figure out that the first (rightmost) bit in the window corresponds to bit index 32 * (i >> SHIFT). (The window starts afteri >> SHIFT slots in x, and each slot has 32 bits.) Since that's the first bit in the window (position 0), then the bit we're interested in is is at position
i - (32 * (i >> SHIFT))
in the windows. With a little experimenting, you can convince yourself that this expression is always equal to i % 32 (actually, that's one definition of the mod operator) which, in turn, is always equal to i & MASK. Since this last expression is the fastest way to calculate what we want, that's what we'll use.
From here, the rest is pretty simple. We start with a single bit in the least-significant position of the window (that is, the constant 1), and move it to the left by i & MASK bits to get it to the position in the window corresponding to bit i in the bit vector. This is where the expression
1 << (i & MASK)
comes from. With the bit now moved to where we want it, we can use this as a mask to set, clear, or query the value of the bit at that position in x[i>>SHIFT] and we know that we're actually setting, clearing, or querying the value of bit i in our bit vector.
If you store your bits in an array of n words you can imagine them to be layed out as a matrix with n rows and 32 columns (BITSPERWORD):
3 0
1 0
0 xxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxx
1 xxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxx
2 xxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxx
....
n xxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxx
To get the k-th bit you divide k by 32. The (integer) result will give you the row (word) the bit is in, the reminder will give you which bit is within the word.
Dividing by 2^p can be done simply by shifting p postions to the right. The reminder can be obtained by getting the p rightmost bits (i.e the bitwise AND with (2^p - 1)).
In C terms:
#define div32(k) ((k) >> 5)
#define mod32(k) ((k) & 31)
#define word_the_bit_is_in(k) div32(k)
#define bit_within_word(k) mod32(k)
Hope it helps.
I have been given this interview question:
Given an input file with four billion integers, provide an algorithm to generate an integer which is not contained in the file. Assume you have 1 GB memory. Follow up with what you would do if you have only 10 MB of memory.
My analysis:
The size of the file is 4×109×4 bytes = 16 GB.
We can do external sorting, thus letting us know the range of the integers.
My question is what is the best way to detect the missing integer in the sorted big integer sets?
My understanding (after reading all the answers):
Assuming we are talking about 32-bit integers, there are 232 = 4*109 distinct integers.
Case 1: we have 1 GB = 1 * 109 * 8 bits = 8 billion bits memory.
Solution:
If we use one bit representing one distinct integer, it is enough. we don't need sort.
Implementation:
int radix = 8;
byte[] bitfield = new byte[0xffffffff/radix];
void F() throws FileNotFoundException{
Scanner in = new Scanner(new FileReader("a.txt"));
while(in.hasNextInt()){
int n = in.nextInt();
bitfield[n/radix] |= (1 << (n%radix));
}
for(int i = 0; i< bitfield.lenght; i++){
for(int j =0; j<radix; j++){
if( (bitfield[i] & (1<<j)) == 0) System.out.print(i*radix+j);
}
}
}
Case 2: 10 MB memory = 10 * 106 * 8 bits = 80 million bits
Solution:
For all possible 16-bit prefixes, there are 216 number of
integers = 65536, we need 216 * 4 * 8 = 2 million bits. We need build 65536 buckets. For each bucket, we need 4 bytes holding all possibilities because the worst case is all the 4 billion integers belong to the same bucket.
Build the counter of each bucket through the first pass through the file.
Scan the buckets, find the first one who has less than 65536 hit.
Build new buckets whose high 16-bit prefixes are we found in step2
through second pass of the file
Scan the buckets built in step3, find the first bucket which doesnt
have a hit.
The code is very similar to above one.
Conclusion:
We decrease memory through increasing file pass.
A clarification for those arriving late: The question, as asked, does not say that there is exactly one integer that is not contained in the file—at least that's not how most people interpret it. Many comments in the comment thread are about that variation of the task, though. Unfortunately the comment that introduced it to the comment thread was later deleted by its author, so now it looks like the orphaned replies to it just misunderstood everything. It's very confusing, sorry.
Assuming that "integer" means 32 bits: 10 MB of space is more than enough for you to count how many numbers there are in the input file with any given 16-bit prefix, for all possible 16-bit prefixes in one pass through the input file. At least one of the buckets will have be hit less than 216 times. Do a second pass to find of which of the possible numbers in that bucket are used already.
If it means more than 32 bits, but still of bounded size: Do as above, ignoring all input numbers that happen to fall outside the (signed or unsigned; your choice) 32-bit range.
If "integer" means mathematical integer: Read through the input once and keep track of the largest number length of the longest number you've ever seen. When you're done, output the maximum plus one a random number that has one more digit. (One of the numbers in the file may be a bignum that takes more than 10 MB to represent exactly, but if the input is a file, then you can at least represent the length of anything that fits in it).
Statistically informed algorithms solve this problem using fewer passes than deterministic approaches.
If very large integers are allowed then one can generate a number that is likely to be unique in O(1) time. A pseudo-random 128-bit integer like a GUID will only collide with one of the existing four billion integers in the set in less than one out of every 64 billion billion billion cases.
If integers are limited to 32 bits then one can generate a number that is likely to be unique in a single pass using much less than 10 MB. The odds that a pseudo-random 32-bit integer will collide with one of the 4 billion existing integers is about 93% (4e9 / 2^32). The odds that 1000 pseudo-random integers will all collide is less than one in 12,000 billion billion billion (odds-of-one-collision ^ 1000). So if a program maintains a data structure containing 1000 pseudo-random candidates and iterates through the known integers, eliminating matches from the candidates, it is all but certain to find at least one integer that is not in the file.
A detailed discussion on this problem has been discussed in Jon Bentley "Column 1. Cracking the Oyster" Programming Pearls Addison-Wesley pp.3-10
Bentley discusses several approaches, including external sort, Merge Sort using several external files etc., But the best method Bentley suggests is a single pass algorithm using bit fields, which he humorously calls "Wonder Sort" :)
Coming to the problem, 4 billion numbers can be represented in :
4 billion bits = (4000000000 / 8) bytes = about 0.466 GB
The code to implement the bitset is simple: (taken from solutions page )
#define BITSPERWORD 32
#define SHIFT 5
#define MASK 0x1F
#define N 10000000
int a[1 + N/BITSPERWORD];
void set(int i) { a[i>>SHIFT] |= (1<<(i & MASK)); }
void clr(int i) { a[i>>SHIFT] &= ~(1<<(i & MASK)); }
int test(int i){ return a[i>>SHIFT] & (1<<(i & MASK)); }
Bentley's algorithm makes a single pass over the file, setting the appropriate bit in the array and then examines this array using test macro above to find the missing number.
If the available memory is less than 0.466 GB, Bentley suggests a k-pass algorithm, which divides the input into ranges depending on available memory. To take a very simple example, if only 1 byte (i.e memory to handle 8 numbers ) was available and the range was from 0 to 31, we divide this into ranges of 0 to 7, 8-15, 16-22 and so on and handle this range in each of 32/8 = 4 passes.
HTH.
Since the problem does not specify that we have to find the smallest possible number that is not in the file we could just generate a number that is longer than the input file itself. :)
For the 1 GB RAM variant you can use a bit vector. You need to allocate 4 billion bits == 500 MB byte array. For each number you read from the input, set the corresponding bit to '1'. Once you done, iterate over the bits, find the first one that is still '0'. Its index is the answer.
If they are 32-bit integers (likely from the choice of ~4 billion numbers close to 232), your list of 4 billion numbers will take up at most 93% of the possible integers (4 * 109 / (232) ). So if you create a bit-array of 232 bits with each bit initialized to zero (which will take up 229 bytes ~ 500 MB of RAM; remember a byte = 23 bits = 8 bits), read through your integer list and for each int set the corresponding bit-array element from 0 to 1; and then read through your bit-array and return the first bit that's still 0.
In the case where you have less RAM (~10 MB), this solution needs to be slightly modified. 10 MB ~ 83886080 bits is still enough to do a bit-array for all numbers between 0 and 83886079. So you could read through your list of ints; and only record #s that are between 0 and 83886079 in your bit array. If the numbers are randomly distributed; with overwhelming probability (it differs by 100% by about 10-2592069) you will find a missing int). In fact, if you only choose numbers 1 to 2048 (with only 256 bytes of RAM) you'd still find a missing number an overwhelming percentage (99.99999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999995%) of the time.
But let's say instead of having about 4 billion numbers; you had something like 232 - 1 numbers and less than 10 MB of RAM; so any small range of ints only has a small possibility of not containing the number.
If you were guaranteed that each int in the list was unique, you could sum the numbers and subtract the sum with one # missing to the full sum (½)(232)(232 - 1) = 9223372034707292160 to find the missing int. However, if an int occurred twice this method will fail.
However, you can always divide and conquer. A naive method, would be to read through the array and count the number of numbers that are in the first half (0 to 231-1) and second half (231, 232). Then pick the range with fewer numbers and repeat dividing that range in half. (Say if there were two less number in (231, 232) then your next search would count the numbers in the range (231, 3*230-1), (3*230, 232). Keep repeating until you find a range with zero numbers and you have your answer. Should take O(lg N) ~ 32 reads through the array.
That method was inefficient. We are only using two integers in each step (or about 8 bytes of RAM with a 4 byte (32-bit) integer). A better method would be to divide into sqrt(232) = 216 = 65536 bins, each with 65536 numbers in a bin. Each bin requires 4 bytes to store its count, so you need 218 bytes = 256 kB. So bin 0 is (0 to 65535=216-1), bin 1 is (216=65536 to 2*216-1=131071), bin 2 is (2*216=131072 to 3*216-1=196607). In python you'd have something like:
import numpy as np
nums_in_bin = np.zeros(65536, dtype=np.uint32)
for N in four_billion_int_array:
nums_in_bin[N // 65536] += 1
for bin_num, bin_count in enumerate(nums_in_bin):
if bin_count < 65536:
break # we have found an incomplete bin with missing ints (bin_num)
Read through the ~4 billion integer list; and count how many ints fall in each of the 216 bins and find an incomplete_bin that doesn't have all 65536 numbers. Then you read through the 4 billion integer list again; but this time only notice when integers are in that range; flipping a bit when you find them.
del nums_in_bin # allow gc to free old 256kB array
from bitarray import bitarray
my_bit_array = bitarray(65536) # 32 kB
my_bit_array.setall(0)
for N in four_billion_int_array:
if N // 65536 == bin_num:
my_bit_array[N % 65536] = 1
for i, bit in enumerate(my_bit_array):
if not bit:
print bin_num*65536 + i
break
Why make it so complicated? You ask for an integer not present in the file?
According to the rules specified, the only thing you need to store is the largest integer that you encountered so far in the file. Once the entire file has been read, return a number 1 greater than that.
There is no risk of hitting maxint or anything, because according to the rules, there is no restriction to the size of the integer or the number returned by the algorithm.
This can be solved in very little space using a variant of binary search.
Start off with the allowed range of numbers, 0 to 4294967295.
Calculate the midpoint.
Loop through the file, counting how many numbers were equal, less than or higher than the midpoint value.
If no numbers were equal, you're done. The midpoint number is the answer.
Otherwise, choose the range that had the fewest numbers and repeat from step 2 with this new range.
This will require up to 32 linear scans through the file, but it will only use a few bytes of memory for storing the range and the counts.
This is essentially the same as Henning's solution, except it uses two bins instead of 16k.
EDIT Ok, this wasn't quite thought through as it assumes the integers in the file follow some static distribution. Apparently they don't need to, but even then one should try this:
There are ≈4.3 billion 32-bit integers. We don't know how they are distributed in the file, but the worst case is the one with the highest Shannon entropy: an equal distribution. In this case, the probablity for any one integer to not occur in the file is
( (2³²-1)/2³² )⁴ ⁰⁰⁰ ⁰⁰⁰ ⁰⁰⁰ ≈ .4
The lower the Shannon entropy, the higher this probability gets on the average, but even for this worst case we have a chance of 90% to find a nonoccurring number after 5 guesses with random integers. Just create such numbers with a pseudorandom generator, store them in a list. Then read int after int and compare it to all of your guesses. When there's a match, remove this list entry. After having been through all of the file, chances are you will have more than one guess left. Use any of them. In the rare (10% even at worst case) event of no guess remaining, get a new set of random integers, perhaps more this time (10->99%).
Memory consumption: a few dozen bytes, complexity: O(n), overhead: neclectable as most of the time will be spent in the unavoidable hard disk accesses rather than comparing ints anyway.
The actual worst case, when we do not assume a static distribution, is that every integer occurs max. once, because then only
1 - 4000000000/2³² ≈ 6%
of all integers don't occur in the file. So you'll need some more guesses, but that still won't cost hurtful amounts of memory.
If you have one integer missing from the range [0, 2^x - 1] then just xor them all together. For example:
>>> 0 ^ 1 ^ 3
2
>>> 0 ^ 1 ^ 2 ^ 3 ^ 4 ^ 6 ^ 7
5
(I know this doesn't answer the question exactly, but it's a good answer to a very similar question.)
They may be looking to see if you have heard of a probabilistic Bloom Filter which can very efficiently determine absolutely if a value is not part of a large set, (but can only determine with high probability it is a member of the set.)
Based on the current wording in the original question, the simplest solution is:
Find the maximum value in the file, then add 1 to it.
Use a BitSet. 4 billion integers (assuming up to 2^32 integers) packed into a BitSet at 8 per byte is 2^32 / 2^3 = 2^29 = approx 0.5 Gb.
To add a bit more detail - every time you read a number, set the corresponding bit in the BitSet. Then, do a pass over the BitSet to find the first number that's not present. In fact, you could do this just as effectively by repeatedly picking a random number and testing if it's present.
Actually BitSet.nextClearBit(0) will tell you the first non-set bit.
Looking at the BitSet API, it appears to only support 0..MAX_INT, so you may need 2 BitSets - one for +'ve numbers and one for -'ve numbers - but the memory requirements don't change.
If there is no size limit, the quickest way is to take the length of the file, and generate the length of the file+1 number of random digits (or just "11111..." s). Advantage: you don't even need to read the file, and you can minimize memory use nearly to zero. Disadvantage: You will print billions of digits.
However, if the only factor was minimizing memory usage, and nothing else is important, this would be the optimal solution. It might even get you a "worst abuse of the rules" award.
If we assume that the range of numbers will always be 2^n (an even power of 2), then exclusive-or will work (as shown by another poster). As far as why, let's prove it:
The Theory
Given any 0 based range of integers that has 2^n elements with one element missing, you can find that missing element by simply xor-ing the known values together to yield the missing number.
The Proof
Let's look at n = 2. For n=2, we can represent 4 unique integers: 0, 1, 2, 3. They have a bit pattern of:
0 - 00
1 - 01
2 - 10
3 - 11
Now, if we look, each and every bit is set exactly twice. Therefore, since it is set an even number of times, and exclusive-or of the numbers will yield 0. If a single number is missing, the exclusive-or will yield a number that when exclusive-ored with the missing number will result in 0. Therefore, the missing number, and the resulting exclusive-ored number are exactly the same. If we remove 2, the resulting xor will be 10 (or 2).
Now, let's look at n+1. Let's call the number of times each bit is set in n, x and the number of times each bit is set in n+1 y. The value of y will be equal to y = x * 2 because there are x elements with the n+1 bit set to 0, and x elements with the n+1 bit set to 1. And since 2x will always be even, n+1 will always have each bit set an even number of times.
Therefore, since n=2 works, and n+1 works, the xor method will work for all values of n>=2.
The Algorithm For 0 Based Ranges
This is quite simple. It uses 2*n bits of memory, so for any range <= 32, 2 32 bit integers will work (ignoring any memory consumed by the file descriptor). And it makes a single pass of the file.
long supplied = 0;
long result = 0;
while (supplied = read_int_from_file()) {
result = result ^ supplied;
}
return result;
The Algorithm For Arbitrary Based Ranges
This algorithm will work for ranges of any starting number to any ending number, as long as the total range is equal to 2^n... This basically re-bases the range to have the minimum at 0. But it does require 2 passes through the file (the first to grab the minimum, the second to compute the missing int).
long supplied = 0;
long result = 0;
long offset = INT_MAX;
while (supplied = read_int_from_file()) {
if (supplied < offset) {
offset = supplied;
}
}
reset_file_pointer();
while (supplied = read_int_from_file()) {
result = result ^ (supplied - offset);
}
return result + offset;
Arbitrary Ranges
We can apply this modified method to a set of arbitrary ranges, since all ranges will cross a power of 2^n at least once. This works only if there is a single missing bit. It takes 2 passes of an unsorted file, but it will find the single missing number every time:
long supplied = 0;
long result = 0;
long offset = INT_MAX;
long n = 0;
double temp;
while (supplied = read_int_from_file()) {
if (supplied < offset) {
offset = supplied;
}
}
reset_file_pointer();
while (supplied = read_int_from_file()) {
n++;
result = result ^ (supplied - offset);
}
// We need to increment n one value so that we take care of the missing
// int value
n++
while (n == 1 || 0 != (n & (n - 1))) {
result = result ^ (n++);
}
return result + offset;
Basically, re-bases the range around 0. Then, it counts the number of unsorted values to append as it computes the exclusive-or. Then, it adds 1 to the count of unsorted values to take care of the missing value (count the missing one). Then, keep xoring the n value, incremented by 1 each time until n is a power of 2. The result is then re-based back to the original base. Done.
Here's the algorithm I tested in PHP (using an array instead of a file, but same concept):
function find($array) {
$offset = min($array);
$n = 0;
$result = 0;
foreach ($array as $value) {
$result = $result ^ ($value - $offset);
$n++;
}
$n++; // This takes care of the missing value
while ($n == 1 || 0 != ($n & ($n - 1))) {
$result = $result ^ ($n++);
}
return $result + $offset;
}
Fed in an array with any range of values (I tested including negatives) with one inside that range which is missing, it found the correct value each time.
Another Approach
Since we can use external sorting, why not just check for a gap? If we assume the file is sorted prior to the running of this algorithm:
long supplied = 0;
long last = read_int_from_file();
while (supplied = read_int_from_file()) {
if (supplied != last + 1) {
return last + 1;
}
last = supplied;
}
// The range is contiguous, so what do we do here? Let's return last + 1:
return last + 1;
Trick question, unless it's been quoted improperly. Just read through the file once to get the maximum integer n, and return n+1.
Of course you'd need a backup plan in case n+1 causes an integer overflow.
Check the size of the input file, then output any number which is too large to be represented by a file that size. This may seem like a cheap trick, but it's a creative solution to an interview problem, it neatly sidesteps the memory issue, and it's technically O(n).
void maxNum(ulong filesize)
{
ulong bitcount = filesize * 8; //number of bits in file
for (ulong i = 0; i < bitcount; i++)
{
Console.Write(9);
}
}
Should print 10 bitcount - 1, which will always be greater than 2 bitcount. Technically, the number you have to beat is 2 bitcount - (4 * 109 - 1), since you know there are (4 billion - 1) other integers in the file, and even with perfect compression they'll take up at least one bit each.
The simplest approach is to find the minimum number in the file, and return 1 less than that. This uses O(1) storage, and O(n) time for a file of n numbers. However, it will fail if number range is limited, which could make min-1 not-a-number.
The simple and straightforward method of using a bitmap has already been mentioned. That method uses O(n) time and storage.
A 2-pass method with 2^16 counting-buckets has also been mentioned. It reads 2*n integers, so uses O(n) time and O(1) storage, but it cannot handle datasets with more than 2^16 numbers. However, it's easily extended to (eg) 2^60 64-bit integers by running 4 passes instead of 2, and easily adapted to using tiny memory by using only as many bins as fit in memory and increasing the number of passes correspondingly, in which case run time is no longer O(n) but instead is O(n*log n).
The method of XOR'ing all the numbers together, mentioned so far by rfrankel and at length by ircmaxell answers the question asked in stackoverflow#35185, as ltn100 pointed out. It uses O(1) storage and O(n) run time. If for the moment we assume 32-bit integers, XOR has a 7% probability of producing a distinct number. Rationale: given ~ 4G distinct numbers XOR'd together, and ca. 300M not in file, the number of set bits in each bit position has equal chance of being odd or even. Thus, 2^32 numbers have equal likelihood of arising as the XOR result, of which 93% are already in file. Note that if the numbers in file aren't all distinct, the XOR method's probability of success rises.
Strip the white space and non numeric characters from the file and append 1. Your file now contains a single number not listed in the original file.
From Reddit by Carbonetc.
For some reason, as soon as I read this problem I thought of diagonalization. I'm assuming arbitrarily large integers.
Read the first number. Left-pad it with zero bits until you have 4 billion bits. If the first (high-order) bit is 0, output 1; else output 0. (You don't really have to left-pad: you just output a 1 if there are not enough bits in the number.) Do the same with the second number, except use its second bit. Continue through the file in this way. You will output a 4-billion bit number one bit at a time, and that number will not be the same as any in the file. Proof: it were the same as the nth number, then they would agree on the nth bit, but they don't by construction.
You can use bit flags to mark whether an integer is present or not.
After traversing the entire file, scan each bit to determine if the number exists or not.
Assuming each integer is 32 bit, they will conveniently fit in 1 GB of RAM if bit flagging is done.
Just for the sake of completeness, here is another very simple solution, which will most likely take a very long time to run, but uses very little memory.
Let all possible integers be the range from int_min to int_max, and
bool isNotInFile(integer) a function which returns true if the file does not contain a certain integer and false else (by comparing that certain integer with each integer in the file)
for (integer i = int_min; i <= int_max; ++i)
{
if (isNotInFile(i)) {
return i;
}
}
For the 10 MB memory constraint:
Convert the number to its binary representation.
Create a binary tree where left = 0 and right = 1.
Insert each number in the tree using its binary representation.
If a number has already been inserted, the leafs will already have been created.
When finished, just take a path that has not been created before to create the requested number.
4 billion number = 2^32, meaning 10 MB might not be sufficient.
EDIT
An optimization is possible, if two ends leafs have been created and have a common parent, then they can be removed and the parent flagged as not a solution. This cuts branches and reduces the need for memory.
EDIT II
There is no need to build the tree completely too. You only need to build deep branches if numbers are similar. If we cut branches too, then this solution might work in fact.
I will answer the 1 GB version:
There is not enough information in the question, so I will state some assumptions first:
The integer is 32 bits with range -2,147,483,648 to 2,147,483,647.
Pseudo-code:
var bitArray = new bit[4294967296]; // 0.5 GB, initialized to all 0s.
foreach (var number in file) {
bitArray[number + 2147483648] = 1; // Shift all numbers so they start at 0.
}
for (var i = 0; i < 4294967296; i++) {
if (bitArray[i] == 0) {
return i - 2147483648;
}
}
As long as we're doing creative answers, here is another one.
Use the external sort program to sort the input file numerically. This will work for any amount of memory you may have (it will use file storage if needed).
Read through the sorted file and output the first number that is missing.
Bit Elimination
One way is to eliminate bits, however this might not actually yield a result (chances are it won't). Psuedocode:
long val = 0xFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF; // (all bits set)
foreach long fileVal in file
{
val = val & ~fileVal;
if (val == 0) error;
}
Bit Counts
Keep track of the bit counts; and use the bits with the least amounts to generate a value. Again this has no guarantee of generating a correct value.
Range Logic
Keep track of a list ordered ranges (ordered by start). A range is defined by the structure:
struct Range
{
long Start, End; // Inclusive.
}
Range startRange = new Range { Start = 0x0, End = 0xFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF };
Go through each value in the file and try and remove it from the current range. This method has no memory guarantees, but it should do pretty well.
2128*1018 + 1 ( which is (28)16*1018 + 1 ) - cannot it be a universal answer for today? This represents a number that cannot be held in 16 EB file, which is the maximum file size in any current file system.
I think this is a solved problem (see above), but there's an interesting side case to keep in mind because it might get asked:
If there are exactly 4,294,967,295 (2^32 - 1) 32-bit integers with no repeats, and therefore only one is missing, there is a simple solution.
Start a running total at zero, and for each integer in the file, add that integer with 32-bit overflow (effectively, runningTotal = (runningTotal + nextInteger) % 4294967296). Once complete, add 4294967296/2 to the running total, again with 32-bit overflow. Subtract this from 4294967296, and the result is the missing integer.
The "only one missing integer" problem is solvable with only one run, and only 64 bits of RAM dedicated to the data (32 for the running total, 32 to read in the next integer).
Corollary: The more general specification is extremely simple to match if we aren't concerned with how many bits the integer result must have. We just generate a big enough integer that it cannot be contained in the file we're given. Again, this takes up absolutely minimal RAM. See the pseudocode.
# Grab the file size
fseek(fp, 0L, SEEK_END);
sz = ftell(fp);
# Print a '2' for every bit of the file.
for (c=0; c<sz; c++) {
for (b=0; b<4; b++) {
print "2";
}
}
As Ryan said it basically, sort the file and then go over the integers and when a value is skipped there you have it :)
EDIT at downvoters: the OP mentioned that the file could be sorted so this is a valid method.
If you don't assume the 32-bit constraint, just return a randomly generated 64-bit number (or 128-bit if you're a pessimist). The chance of collision is 1 in 2^64/(4*10^9) = 4611686018.4 (roughly 1 in 4 billion). You'd be right most of the time!
(Joking... kind of.)