I have a list of Integers and I want to make a String of it.
var xs = list(1,2,3,4,5)
(xs foldLeft "") (_+_) // String = 12345
with foldLeft it works perfect, but my question is does it also work with reduceLeft? And if yes, how?
It cannot work this way with reduceLeft. Informally you can view reduceLeft as a special case of foldLeft where the accumulated value is of the same type as the collection's elements. Because in your case the element type is Int and the accumulated value is String, there is no way to use reduceLeft in the way you used foldLeft.
However in this specific case you can simply convert all your Int elements to String up front, and then reduce:
scala> xs.map(_.toString) reduceLeft(_+_)
res5: String = 12345
Note that this will throw an exception if the list is empty. This is another difference with foldLeft, which handles the empty case just fine (because it has an explicit starting value).
This is also less efficient because we create a whole new collection (of strings) just to reduce it on the spot.
All in all, foldLeft is a much better choice here.
It takes a little bit of work to make sure the types are understood correctly. Expanding them, though, you could use something like:
(xs reduceLeft ((a: Any, b: Int) => a + b.toString)).toString
Related
I have a Tuple where I have stored anonymous functions, I want to iterate through them and execute them.
val functions = ((x:Int, y:Int) => x + y, (x:Int, y: Int) => x - y)
// I want to execute the anonymous functions in the Tuple
functions.productIterator.foreach(function => function)
Unfortunately I am not able to do
functions.productIterator.foreach(function => function(1, 2))
OR
functions.productIterator.foreach(_(1, 2))
what is the way out.
Tuples are not meant to be iterated over. The types get lost because each entry in a tuple is able to be a different type and so the type system just assumes Any (thus the Iterator[Any]). So the real suggestion is that if you want to iterate, use a collection like a Seq or Set.
On the other hand, if you know that the tuple contains functions of a particular type, then you can bypass the type checking by casting with asInstanceOf, but this is not recommended because type checking is your friend.
functions.productIterator.map(_.asInstanceOf[(Int,Int)=>Int](1, 2))
// produces `Iterator(3, -1)`
Alternatively, have a look at HLists in Shapeless, which have properties of both tuples and collections.
productIterator on a Tuple returns Iterator[Any] and not Iterator[Function2[Int, Int, Int]] as you're expecting.
We can extract the elements of the tuple into a Seq while preserving type information; hence
Seq(functions._1, functions._2).map(_(1,2))
List(3, -1)
I was trying to find line with maximum words, and i wrote the following lines, to run on spark-shell:
import java.lang.Math
val counts = textFile.map(line => line.split(" ").size).reduce((a, b) => Math.max(a, b))
But since, map is one to one , and flatMap is one to either zero or anything. So i tried replacing map with flatMap, in above code. But its giving error as:
<console>:24: error: type mismatch;
found : Int
required: TraversableOnce[?]
val counts = F1.flatMap(s => s.split(" ").size).reduce((a,b)=> Math.max(a,b))
If anybody could make me understand the reason, it will really be helpful.
flatMap must return an Iterable which is clearly not what you want. You do want a map because you want to map a line to the number of words, so you want a one-to-one function that takes a line and maps it to the number of words (though you could create a collection with one element, being the size of course...).
FlatMap is meant to associate a collection to an input, for instance if you wanted to map a line to all its words you would do:
val words = textFile.flatMap(x => x.split(" "))
and that would return an RDD[String] containing all the words.
In the end, map transforms an RDD of size N into another RDD of size N (e.g. your lines to their length) whereas flatMap transforms an RDD of size N into an RDD of size P (actually an RDD of size N into an RDD of size N made of collections, all these collections are then flattened to produce the RDD of size P).
P.S.: one last word that has nothing to do with your problem, it is more efficient to do (for a string s)
val nbWords = s.split(" ").length
than call .size(). Indeed, the split method returns an array of String and arrays do not have a size method. So when you call .size() you have an implicit conversion from Array[String] to SeqLike[String] which creates new objects. But Array[T] do have a length field so there's no conversion calling length. (It's a detail but I think it's good habit though).
Any use of map can be replaced by flatMap, but the function argument has to be changed to return a single-element List: textFile.flatMap(line => List(line.split(" ").size)). This isn't a good idea: it just makes your code less understandable and less efficient.
After reading Tired of Null Pointer Exceptions? Consider Using Java SE 8's Optional!'s part about why use flatMap() rather than Map(), I have realized the truly reason why flatMap() can not replace map() is that map() is not a special case of flatMap().
It's true that flatMap() means one-to-many, but that's not the only thing flatMap() does. It can also strip outer Stream() if put it simply.
See the definations of map and flatMap:
Stream<R> map(Function<? super T, ? extends R> mapper)
Stream<R> flatMap(Function<? super T, ? extends Stream<? extends R>> mapper)
the only difference is the type of returned value in inner function. What map() returned is "Stream<'what inner function returned'>", while what flatMap() returned is just "what inner function returned".
So you can say that flatMap() can kick outer Stream() away, but map() can't. This is the most difference in my opinion, and also why map() is not just a special case of flatMap().
ps:
If you really want to make one-to-one with flatMap, then you should change it into one-to-List(one). That means you should add an outer Stream() manually which will be stripped by flatMap() later. After that you'll get the same effect as using map().(Certainly, it's clumsy. So don't do like that.)
Here are examples for Java8, but the same as Scala:
use map():
list.stream().map(line -> line.split(" ").length)
deprecated use flatMap():
list.stream().flatMap(line -> Arrays.asList(line.split(" ").length).stream())
I have a for-comprehension with a generator from a Set[MyType]
This MyType has a lazy val variable called factsPair which returns a pair of sets:
(Set[MyFact], Set[MyFact]).
I wish to loop through all of them and unify the facts into one flattened pair (Set[MyFact], Set[MyFact]) as follows, however I am getting No implicit view available ... and not enough arguments for flatten: implicit (asTraversable ... errors. (I am a bit new to Scala so still trying to get used to the errors).
lazy val allFacts =
(for {
mytype <- mytypeList
} yield mytype.factsPair).flatten
What do I need to specify to flatten for this to work?
Scala flatten works on same types. You have a Seq[(Set[MyFact], Set[MyFact])], which can't be flattened.
I would recommend learning the foldLeft function, because it's very general and quite easy to use as soon as you get the hang of it:
lazy val allFacts = myTypeList.foldLeft((Set[MyFact](), Set[MyFact]())) {
case (accumulator, next) =>
val pairs1 = accumulator._1 ++ next.factsPair._1
val pairs2 = accumulator._2 ++ next.factsPair._2
(pairs1, pairs2)
}
The first parameter takes the initial element it will append the other elements to. We start with an empty Tuple[Set[MyFact], Set[MyFact]] initialized like this: (Set[MyFact](), Set[MyFact]()).
Next we have to specify the function that takes the accumulator and appends the next element to it and returns with the new accumulator that has the next element in it. Because of all the tuples, it doesn't look nice, but works.
You won't be able to use flatten for this, because flatten on a collection returns a collection, and a tuple is not a collection.
You can, of course, just split, flatten, and join again:
val pairs = for {
mytype <- mytypeList
} yield mytype.factsPair
val (first, second) = pairs.unzip
val allFacts = (first.flatten, second.flatten)
A tuple isn't traverable, so you can't flatten over it. You need to return something that can be iterated over, like a List, for example:
List((1,2), (3,4)).flatten // bad
List(List(1,2), List(3,4)).flatten // good
I'd like to offer a more algebraic view. What you have here can be nicely solved using monoids. For each monoid there is a zero element and an operation to combine two elements into one.
In this case, sets for a monoid: the zero element is an empty set and the operation is a union. And if we have two monoids, their Cartesian product is also a monoid, where the operations are defined pairwise (see examples on Wikipedia).
Scalaz defines monoids for sets as well as tuples, so we don't need to do anything there. We'll just need a helper function that combines multiple monoid elements into one, which is implemented easily using folding:
def msum[A](ps: Iterable[A])(implicit m: Monoid[A]): A =
ps.foldLeft(m.zero)(m.append(_, _))
(perhaps there already is such a function in Scala, I didn't find it). Using msum we can easily define
def pairs(ps: Iterable[MyType]): (Set[MyFact], Set[MyFact]) =
msum(ps.map(_.factsPair))
using Scalaz's implicit monoids for tuples and sets.
I understand how to use reduceLeft on simple lists of integers but attempts to use if on case class objects fail.
Assume I have:
case class LogMsg(time:Int, cat:String, msg:String)
val cList = List(LogMsg(1,"a", "bla"), LogMsg(2,"a", "bla"), LogMsg(4,"b", "bla"))
and I want to find the largest difference in time between LogMsgs.
I want to do something like:
cList.reduceLeft((a,b) => (b.time - a.time)
which of course doesn't work.
The first iteration of reduceLeft compares the first two elements, which are both of type LogMsg. After that it compares the next element (LogMsg) with the result of the first iteration (Int).
Do I just have the syntax wrong or should I be doing this another way?
I'd probably do something like this:
(cList, cList.tail).zipped.map((a, b) => b.time - a.time).max
You'll need to check beforehand that cList has at least 2 elements.
reduceLeft can't be used to return the largest difference, because it always returns the type of the List you're reducing, i.e. LogMsg in this case, and you're asking for an Int.
My try:
cList.sliding(2).map(t => t(1).time - t(0).time).max
Another one that came into my mind: since LogMsg is a case class, we can take advantage of pattern matching:
cList.sliding(2).collect{
case List(LogMsg(a, _, _), LogMsg(b, _, _)) => b - a}.
max
I would recommand you to use foldLeft which is a reduceLeft enabling you to initialize the results.
val head::tail = cList
tail.foldLeft((head.time, 0)) ((a,b) => (b.time, math.max(a._2,b.time-a._1)))._2
I have learned the basic difference between foldLeft and reduceLeft
foldLeft:
initial value has to be passed
reduceLeft:
takes first element of the collection as initial value
throws exception if collection is empty
Is there any other difference ?
Any specific reason to have two methods with similar functionality?
Few things to mention here, before giving the actual answer:
Your question doesn't have anything to do with left, it's rather about the difference between reducing and folding
The difference is not the implementation at all, just look at the signatures.
The question doesn't have anything to do with Scala in particular, it's rather about the two concepts of functional programming.
Back to your question:
Here is the signature of foldLeft (could also have been foldRight for the point I'm going to make):
def foldLeft [B] (z: B)(f: (B, A) => B): B
And here is the signature of reduceLeft (again the direction doesn't matter here)
def reduceLeft [B >: A] (f: (B, A) => B): B
These two look very similar and thus caused the confusion. reduceLeft is a special case of foldLeft (which by the way means that you sometimes can express the same thing by using either of them).
When you call reduceLeft say on a List[Int] it will literally reduce the whole list of integers into a single value, which is going to be of type Int (or a supertype of Int, hence [B >: A]).
When you call foldLeft say on a List[Int] it will fold the whole list (imagine rolling a piece of paper) into a single value, but this value doesn't have to be even related to Int (hence [B]).
Here is an example:
def listWithSum(numbers: List[Int]) = numbers.foldLeft((List.empty[Int], 0)) {
(resultingTuple, currentInteger) =>
(currentInteger :: resultingTuple._1, currentInteger + resultingTuple._2)
}
This method takes a List[Int] and returns a Tuple2[List[Int], Int] or (List[Int], Int). It calculates the sum and returns a tuple with a list of integers and it's sum. By the way the list is returned backwards, because we used foldLeft instead of foldRight.
Watch One Fold to rule them all for a more in depth explanation.
reduceLeft is just a convenience method. It is equivalent to
list.tail.foldLeft(list.head)(_)
foldLeft is more generic, you can use it to produce something completely different than what you originally put in. Whereas reduceLeft can only produce an end result of the same type or super type of the collection type. For example:
List(1,3,5).foldLeft(0) { _ + _ }
List(1,3,5).foldLeft(List[String]()) { (a, b) => b.toString :: a }
The foldLeft will apply the closure with the last folded result (first time using initial value) and the next value.
reduceLeft on the other hand will first combine two values from the list and apply those to the closure. Next it will combine the rest of the values with the cumulative result. See:
List(1,3,5).reduceLeft { (a, b) => println("a " + a + ", b " + b); a + b }
If the list is empty foldLeft can present the initial value as a legal result. reduceLeft on the other hand does not have a legal value if it can't find at least one value in the list.
For reference, reduceLeft will error if applied to an empty container with the following error.
java.lang.UnsupportedOperationException: empty.reduceLeft
Reworking the code to use
myList foldLeft(List[String]()) {(a,b) => a+b}
is one potential option. Another is to use the reduceLeftOption variant which returns an Option wrapped result.
myList reduceLeftOption {(a,b) => a+b} match {
case None => // handle no result as necessary
case Some(v) => println(v)
}
The basic reason they are both in Scala standard library is probably because they are both in Haskell standard library (called foldl and foldl1). If reduceLeft wasn't, it would quite often be defined as a convenience method in different projects.
From Functional Programming Principles in Scala (Martin Odersky):
The function reduceLeft is defined in terms of a more general function, foldLeft.
foldLeft is like reduceLeft but takes an accumulator z, as an additional parameter, which is returned when foldLeft is called on an empty list:
(List (x1, ..., xn) foldLeft z)(op) = (...(z op x1) op ...) op x
[as opposed to reduceLeft, which throws an exception when called on an empty list.]
The course (see lecture 5.5) provides abstract definitions of these functions, which illustrates their differences, although they are very similar in their use of pattern matching and recursion.
abstract class List[T] { ...
def reduceLeft(op: (T,T)=>T) : T = this match{
case Nil => throw new Error("Nil.reduceLeft")
case x :: xs => (xs foldLeft x)(op)
}
def foldLeft[U](z: U)(op: (U,T)=>U): U = this match{
case Nil => z
case x :: xs => (xs foldLeft op(z, x))(op)
}
}
Note that foldLeft returns a value of type U, which is not necessarily the same type as List[T], but reduceLeft returns a value of the same type as the list).
To really understand what are you doing with fold/reduce,
check this: http://wiki.tcl.tk/17983
very good explanation. once you get the concept of fold,
reduce will come together with the answer above:
list.tail.foldLeft(list.head)(_)
Scala 2.13.3, Demo:
val names = List("Foo", "Bar")
println("ReduceLeft: "+ names.reduceLeft(_+_))
println("ReduceRight: "+ names.reduceRight(_+_))
println("Fold: "+ names.fold("Other")(_+_))
println("FoldLeft: "+ names.foldLeft("Other")(_+_))
println("FoldRight: "+ names.foldRight("Other")(_+_))
outputs:
ReduceLeft: FooBar
ReduceRight: FooBar
Fold: OtherFooBar
FoldLeft: OtherFooBar
FoldRight: FooBarOther