sort a dictionary by keys in specific order

[spohle]

hi i have a normal dictionary with key and value pairs. now i wanna
sort by the keys BUT in a specific order i determine in a list !? any
ideas

dic = {'key1':'value1 ', 'key2':'value2' , 'key3':'value3' }

list = [key2, key3, key1]

[Paul Rubin]

Re: sort a dictionary by keys in specific order

"spohle" <spohle@gmail.c om> writes:[color=blue]
> dic = {'key1':'value1 ', 'key2':'value2' , 'key3':'value3' }
>
> list = [key2, key3, key1][/color]

Is this what you want?

dic = {'key1':'value1 ', 'key2':'value2' , 'key3':'value3' }
keys = ['key2', 'key3', 'key1']
items = [dic[k] for k in keys]
print items

[Tim Chase]

Re: sort a dictionary by keys in specific order

> hi i have a normal dictionary with key and value pairs. now i wanna[color=blue]
> sort by the keys BUT in a specific order i determine in a list !? any
> ideas
>
> dic = {'key1':'value1 ', 'key2':'value2' , 'key3':'value3' }
>
> list = [key2, key3, key1][/color]

1) it's bad practice to shadow the list() command...funky stuff
can happen.

2) I presume your list is a list of strings, not of references:

order = ['key2', 'key3', 'key1']

3) As a dictionary is an unordered collection, I presume you want
a resulting list of key/value pairs.

If both #2 and #3 hold, you can use

results = [(k,dic[k]) for k in order]

which will return a list of tuples in the desired key order.

-tkc

[spohle]

Re: sort a dictionary by keys in specific order

how do i get the result back into the dictionary ?

[Tim Chase]

Re: sort a dictionary by keys in specific order

> how do i get the result back into the dictionary ?

Well, if you must, if you've just got the results in my
previous post, you can take them and shove them back into a
dict with

results = [('key1','value1 '),('key2','val ue2)]
newDict = dict(results)

If you're not doing anything with that the resulting list of
ordered key/value pairs (such as inserting, printing,
whatever), then skip the whole matter:

newDict = dic

:)

HOWEVER...as I noted, a dictionary is an INHERENTLY UNSORTED
COLLECTION. There are some wrapper-classes around that will
feign sortedness if you want them, but they may not handle
your custom sortedness constraint.

There are few reasons for a sorted dict. Most of them
regard displaying them. If this is the case, just do the
sorting/selection of the items before you print:

print "\n".join([dic[k] for k in order])

Other reasons might involve dependancies, where some process
requires that you access the keys in a particular order.
Just order them before you call the process.

-tkc

[spohle]

Re: sort a dictionary by keys in specific order

i write the dict out to a file, not with file methods but rather with
an inhouse python code. unfortunatly the order plays a big role for
that.

[Bruno Desthuilliers]

Re: sort a dictionary by keys in specific order

Tim Chase a écrit :
(snip)[color=blue]
>[color=green]
>> list = [key2, key3, key1][/color]
>
> 1) it's bad practice to shadow the list() command...[/color]

s/command/type/
[color=blue]
> funky stuff can happen.[/color]

indeed, if you shadow it with a non-compatible object !-)

[Bruno Desthuilliers]

Re: sort a dictionary by keys in specific order

spohle a écrit :[color=blue]
> how do i get the result back into the dictionary ?
>[/color]
Python dicts (like almost any known hash-table) are *not* ordered. If
you need an ordered dict, roll your own - this is quite easy.

[Wolfgang Grafen]

Re: sort a dictionary by keys in specific order

spohle wrote:[color=blue]
> hi i have a normal dictionary with key and value pairs. now i wanna
> sort by the keys BUT in a specific order i determine in a list !? any
> ideas
>
> dic = {'key1':'value1 ', 'key2':'value2' , 'key3':'value3' }
>
> list = [key2, key3, key1]
>[/color]

You could use the seqdict package at

http://home.arcor.de/wolfgang.grafen/Python/Modules/Modules.html

Regards

Wolfgang