Hash invert in Ruby? - ruby

Question

I've got a hash of the format:
{key1 => [a, b, c], key2 => [d, e, f]}
and I want to end up with:
{ a => key1, b => key1, c => key1, d => key2 ... }
What's the easiest way of achieving this?
I'm using Ruby on Rails.
UPDATE
OK I managed to extract the real object from the server log, it is being pushed via AJAX.
Parameters: {"status"=>{"1"=>["1", "14"], "2"=>["7", "12", "8", "13"]}}

Answer 1

hash = {:key1 => ["a", "b", "c"], :key2 => ["d", "e", "f"]}
first variant
hash.map{|k, v| v.map{|f| {f => k}}}.flatten
#=> [{"a"=>:key1}, {"b"=>:key1}, {"c"=>:key1}, {"d"=>:key2}, {"e"=>:key2}, {"f"=>:key2}]
or
hash.inject({}){|h, (k,v)| v.map{|f| h[f] = k}; h}
#=> {"a"=>:key1, "b"=>:key1, "c"=>:key1, "d"=>:key2, "e"=>:key2, "f"=>:key2}
UPD
ok, your hash is:
hash = {"status"=>{"1"=>["1", "14"], "2"=>["7", "12", "8", "13"]}}
hash["status"].inject({}){|h, (k,v)| v.map{|f| h[f] = k}; h}
#=> {"12"=>"2", "7"=>"2", "13"=>"2", "8"=>"2", "14"=>"1", "1"=>"1"}

Answer 2

Lots of other good answers. Just wanted to toss this one in too for Ruby 2.0 and 1.9.3:
hash = {apple: [1, 14], orange: [7, 12, 8, 13]}
Hash[hash.flat_map{ |k, v| v.map{ |i| [i, k] } }]
# => {1=>:apple, 14=>:apple, 7=>:orange, 12=>:orange, 8=>:orange, 13=>:orange}
This is leveraging: Hash::[] and Enumerable#flat_map
Also in these new versions there is Enumerable::each_with_object which is very similar to Enumerable::inject/Enumerable::reduce:
hash.each_with_object(Hash.new){ |(k, v), inverse|
v.each{ |e| inverse[e] = k }
}
Performing a quick benchmark (Ruby 2.0.0p0; 2012 Macbook Air) using an original hash with 100 keys, each with 100 distinct values:
Hash::[] w/ Enumerable#flat_map
155.7 (±9.0%) i/s - 780 in 5.066286s
Enumerable#each_with_object w/ Enumerable#each
199.7 (±21.0%) i/s - 940 in 5.068926s
Shows that the each_with_object variant is faster for that data set.

Answer 3

Ok, let's guess. You say you have an array but I agree with Benoit that what you probably have is a hash. A functional approach:
h = {:key1 => ["a", "b", "c"], :key2 => ["d", "e", "f"]}
h.map { |k, vs| Hash[vs.map { |v| [v, k] }] }.inject(:merge)
#=> {"a"=>:key1, "b"=>:key1, "c"=>:key1, "d"=>:key2, "e"=>:key2, "f"=>:key2}
Also:
h.map { |k, vs| Hash[vs.product([k])] }.inject(:merge)
#=> {"a"=>:key1, "b"=>:key1, "c"=>:key1, "d"=>:key2, "e"=>:key2, "f"=>:key2}

Answer 4

In the case where a value corresponds to more than one key, like "c" in this example...
{ :key1 => ["a", "b", "c"], :key2 => ["c", "d", "e"]}
...some of the other answers will not give the expected result. We will need the reversed hash to store the keys in arrays, like so:
{ "a" => [:key1], "b" => [:key1], "c" => [:key1, :key2], "d" => [:key2], "e" => [:key2] }
This should do the trick:
reverse = {}
hash.each{ |k,vs|
vs.each{ |v|
reverse[v] ||= []
reverse[v] << k
}
}
This was my use case, and I would have defined my problem much the same way as the OP (in fact, a search for a similar phrase got me here), so I suspect this answer may help other searchers.

Answer 5

If you're looking to reverse a hash formatted like this, the following may help you:
a = {:key1 => ["a", "b", "c"], :key2 => ["d", "e", "f"]}
a.inject({}) do |memo, (key, values)|
values.each {|value| memo[value] = key }
memo
end
this returns:
{"a"=>:key1, "b"=>:key1, "c"=>:key1, "d"=>:key2, "e"=>:key2, "f"=>:key2}

Answer 6

new_hash={}
hash = {"key1" => ['a', 'b', 'c'], "key2" => ['d','e','f']}
hash.each_pair{|key, val|val.each{|v| new_hash[v] = key }}
This gives
new_hash # {"a"=>"key1", "b"=>"key1", "c"=>"key1", "d"=>"key2", "e"=>"key2", "f"=>"key2"}

Answer 7

If you want to correctly deal with duplicate values, then you should use the Hash#inverse
from Facets of Ruby
Hash#inverse preserves duplicate values,
e.g. it ensures that hash.inverse.inverse == hash
either:
use Hash#inverse from here: http://www.unixgods.org/Ruby/invert_hash.html
use Hash#inverse from FacetsOfRuby library 'facets'
usage like this:
require 'facets'
h = {:key1 => [:a, :b, :c], :key2 => [:d, :e, :f]}
=> {:key1=>[:a, :b, :c], :key2=>[:d, :e, :f]}
h.inverse
=> {:a=>:key1, :b=>:key1, :c=>:key1, :d=>:key2, :e=>:key2, :f=>:key2}
The code looks like this:
# this doesn't looks quite as elegant as the other solutions here,
# but if you call inverse twice, it will preserve the elements of the original hash
# true inversion of Ruby Hash / preserves all elements in original hash
# e.g. hash.inverse.inverse ~ h
class Hash
def inverse
i = Hash.new
self.each_pair{ |k,v|
if (v.class == Array)
v.each{ |x|
i[x] = i.has_key?(x) ? [k,i[x]].flatten : k
}
else
i[v] = i.has_key?(v) ? [k,i[v]].flatten : k
end
}
return i
end
end
h = {:key1 => [:a, :b, :c], :key2 => [:d, :e, :f]}
=> {:key1=>[:a, :b, :c], :key2=>[:d, :e, :f]}
h.inverse
=> {:a=>:key1, :b=>:key1, :c=>:key1, :d=>:key2, :e=>:key2, :f=>:key2}

Answer 8

One way to achieve what you're looking for:
arr = [{["k1"] => ["a", "b", "c"]}, {["k2"] => ["d", "e", "f"]}]
results_arr = []
arr.each do |hsh|
hsh.values.flatten.each do |val|
results_arr << { [val] => hsh.keys.first }···
end
end
Result: [{["a"]=>["k1"]}, {["b"]=>["k1"]}, {["c"]=>["k1"]}, {["d"]=>["k2"]}, {["e"]=>["k2"]}, {["f"]=>["k2"]}]