Dutch National Flag Partition in Python
Three-way partition groups zeros, ones, and twos in one pass.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 | from bisect import bisect_left # Dutch National Flag Partition in Python # # PURPOSE # Three-way partition groups zeros, ones, and twos in one pass. The same idea is useful for # grouping values around a pivot. # # METHOD # Keep a zero prefix, a one middle, an unknown interval, and a two suffix. Swap a zero left, # advance past a one, or swap a two right and re-examine the incoming unknown value. # # COMPLEXITY # O(n) time and O(1) auxiliary space. Not stable. # # CONTRACT # Every value must be 0, 1, or 2. Mutates the array into sorted order and returns 0. # Public APIs infer array lengths except in C, which accepts pointer/length pairs. Vertex # counts and matrix dimensions remain explicit. Arrays must contain signed 32-bit integers. # Sorted order, correct tree topology, and caller-owned data-structure invariants are # preconditions; checking them on every query would change query complexity. # Scalar and shape checks are included. Value-range checks are included where needed to # prevent invalid indexing or nontermination. Allocation sizes are capped at 4,000,000 # workspace entries. Arithmetic outside Python raises an error on 32-bit overflow; Python # uses arbitrary precision. Native allocation failures propagate. In-place outputs may be # partly updated after arithmetic failure. These are single-threaded, in-memory # implementations. # # LANGUAGE DETAILS # Python 3.9+: automatic lengths, native lists, arbitrary-precision arithmetic, and # bisect_left for LIS. Invalid scalar/shape inputs raise ValueError. Integer element types # and sorted/tree invariants remain caller preconditions. # # EXAMPLE # Expected return: 0. # Expected a after call: [0, 0, 1, 2, 2]. # Run: python example.py # Tests for this exact source artifact run before publication. The accompanying source # archive includes unit cases, runtime results, and source hashes. def alg_require(condition): if not condition: raise ValueError("invalid algorithm input; see contract") def alg_size(n): alg_require(0 <= n <= 4000000) return n def dutch_flag(a: list[int]) -> int: alg_require(isinstance(a, list) and len(a) <= 1000000) n: int = len(a) alg_require(n >= 0 and n <= 1000000) alg_require(len(a) == n) for value in a: alg_require(value >= 0 and value <= 2) low: int = 0 mid: int = 0 high: int = n - 1 temp: int = 0 while mid <= high: if a[mid] == 0: temp = a[low] a[low] = a[mid] a[mid] = temp low += 1 mid += 1 elif a[mid] == 1: mid += 1 else: temp = a[mid] a[mid] = a[high] a[high] = temp high -= 1 return 0 a = [2, 0, 1, 2, 0] result = dutch_flag(a) print(result) print(a) # Expected a: [0, 0, 1, 2, 2] |