We Keep Coding

Finding the most specific matching item

User input will be like 'BY1 2PX', which will split and stored into list like below
var items = new List<string> {'BY1 2PX', 'BY12', 'BY1', 'BY'};
I have source list of Products
public class Product
{
public string Name {get;set;}
public string Id {get;set;}
}
Below is a sample product list. There is no guarentee on ordering, it could be in any order.
var products = new List<Product>{
new Product("1", "BY1 2PX"),
new Product("2", "BY12"),
new Product("3", "BY1"),
new Product("4", "BY"),
new Product("5", "AA2 B2X"),
//...etc
}
my output should fetch 1, because its most specific match. If Id = 1 is not there then it should have fetched Id =2 like that...etc Could anyone help me in writing a linq query. I have tried something like below, is this fine?
var result = items.Select(x => products.FirstOrDefault(p =>
string.Equals(p.Name.Trim(), x, StringComparison.OrdinalIgnoreCase)))
.FirstOrDefault();

Well, you can use dictionary with its fast lookups :
var productsDict = products.ToDictionary(p => p.Name, p => p);
var key = items.FirstOrDefault(i => productsDict.ContainsKey(i));
Product result = key != null ? productsDict[key] : null;
Or as Tim suggested, if you have multiple elements with same names you can use Lookup :
var productsDict = products.ToLookup(p => p.Name, p => p);
var key = items.FirstOrDefault(i => productsDict.Contains(i));
Product result = key != null ? productsDict[key] : null;

If you want to select the best-matching product you need to select from the product- not the string-list. You could use following LINQ approach that uses List.FindIndex:
Product bestProduct = products
.Select(p => new {
Product = p,
Index = items.FindIndex(s => String.Equals(p.Name, s, StringComparison.OrdinalIgnoreCase))
})
.Where(x => x.Index != -1)
.OrderBy(x => x.Index) // ensures the best-match logic
.Select(x => x.Product)
.FirstOrDefault();
The Where ensures that you won't get an arbitrary product if there is no matching one.
Update:
A more efficient solution is this query:
Product bestProduct = items
.Select(item => products.FirstOrDefault(p => String.Equals(p.Name, item, StringComparison.OrdinalIgnoreCase)))
.FirstOrDefault(p != null); // ensures the best-match logic

You can try to find resemblance of words by using a specific algorythm called Levenshtein's distance algorythm, which is mostly used on "Did you mean 'word'" on most search websites.
This solution can be found here:
https://stackoverflow.com/a/9453762/1372750
Once you find the distance difference, you can measure which word or phrase is more "like" the searched one.

This will find for each product what is the "most specific" (the longest) match in items and will return the product with the longest match (regardless to order of either of the collections)
var result = products
.Select(p => new
{
Product = p,
MostSpecific = items.Where(item => p.Name.Contains(item))
.OrderByDescending(match => match.Length
.FirstOrDefault()
})
.Where(x => x.MostSpecific != null)
.OrderByDescending(x => x.MostSpecific.Length)
.Select(x => x.Product)
.FirstOrDefault();

Can this query about finding missing keys be improved? (either SQL or LINQ)

I am developing a ASP.NET MVC website and is looking a way to improve this routine. It can be improved either at LINQ level or SQL Server level. I hope at best we can do it within one query call.
Here is the tables involved and some example data:
We have no constraint that every Key has to have each LanguageId value, and indeed the business logic does not allow such contraint. However, at application level, we want to warn the admin that a key is missing a/some language values. So I have this class and query:
public class LocalizationKeyWithMissingCodes
{
public string Key { get; set; }
public IEnumerable<string> MissingCodes { get; set; }
}
This method get the Key list, as well as any missing codes (for example, if we have en + jp + ch language codes, and the key only has values for en + ch, the list will contains jp):
public IEnumerable<LocalizationKeyWithMissingCodes> GetAllKeysWithMissingCodes()
{
var languageList = Utils.ResolveDependency<ILanguageRepository>().GetActive();
var languageIdList = languageList.Select(q => q.Id);
var languageIdDictionary = languageList.ToDictionary(q => q.Id);
var keyList = this.GetActive()
.Select(q => q.Key)
.Distinct();
var result = new List<LocalizationKeyWithMissingCodes>();
foreach (var key in keyList)
{
// Get missing codes
var existingCodes = this.Get(q => q.Active && q.Key == key)
.Select(q => q.LanguageId);
// ToList to make sure it is processed at application
var missingLangId = languageList.Where(q => !existingCodes.Contains(q.Id))
.ToList();
result.Add(new LocalizationKeyWithMissingCodes()
{
Key = key,
MissingCodes = missingLangId
.Select(q => languageIdDictionary[q.Id].Code),
});
}
result = result.OrderByDescending(q => q.MissingCodes.Count() > 0)
.ThenBy(q => q.Key)
.ToList();
return result;
}
I think my current solution is not good, because it make a query call for each key. Is there a way to improve it, by either making it faster, or pack within one query call?
EDIT: This is the final query of the answer:
public IQueryable<LocalizationKeyWithMissingCodes> GetAllKeysWithMissingCodes()
{
var languageList = Utils.ResolveDependency<ILanguageRepository>().GetActive();
var localizationList = this.GetActive();
return localizationList
.GroupBy(q => q.Key, (key, items) => new LocalizationKeyWithMissingCodes()
{
Key = key,
MissingCodes = languageList
.GroupJoin(
items,
lang => lang.Id,
loc => loc.LanguageId,
(lang, loc) => loc.Any() ? null : lang)
.Where(q => q != null)
.Select(q => q.Code)
}).OrderByDescending(q => q.MissingCodes.Count() > 0) // Show the missing keys on the top
.ThenBy(q => q.Key);
}

Another possibility, using LINQ:
public IEnumerable<LocalizationKeyWithMissingCodes> GetAllKeysWithMissingCodes(
List<Language> languages,
List<Localization> localizations)
{
return localizations
.GroupBy(x => x.Key, (key, items) => new LocalizationKeyWithMissingCodes
{
Key = key,
MissingCodes = languages
.GroupJoin( // check if there is one or more match for each language
items,
x => x.Id,
y => y.LanguageId,
(x, ys) => ys.Any() ? null : x)
.Where(x => x != null) // eliminate all languages with a match
.Select(x => x.Code) // grab the code
})
.Where(x => x.MissingCodes.Any()); // eliminate all complete keys
}

Here is the SQL logic to identify the keys that are missing "complete" language assignments:
SELECT
all.[Key],
all.LanguageId
FROM
(
SELECT
loc.[Key],
lang.LanguageId
FROM
Language lang
FULL OUTER JOIN
Localization loc
ON (1 = 1)
WHERE
lang.Active = 1
) all
LEFT JOIN
Localization loc
ON (loc.[Key] = all.[Key])
AND (loc.LanguageId = all.LanguageId)
WHERE
loc.[Key] IS NULL;
To see all keys (instead of filtering):
SELECT
all.[Key],
all.LanguageId,
CASE WHEN loc.[Key] IS NULL THEN 1 ELSE 0 END AS Flagged
FROM
(
SELECT
loc.[Key],
lang.LanguageId
FROM
Language lang
FULL OUTER JOIN
Localization loc
ON (1 = 1)
WHERE
lang.Active = 1
) all
LEFT JOIN
Localization loc
ON (loc.[Key] = all.[Key])
AND (loc.LanguageId = all.LanguageId);

your code seems to be doing a lot of database query and materialization..
in terms of LINQ, the single query would look like this..
we take the cartesian product of language and localization tables to get all combinations of (key, code) and then subtract the (key, code) tuples that exist in the relationship. this gives us the (key, code) combination that don't exist.
var result = context.Languages.Join(context.Localizations, lang => true,
loc => true, (lang, loc) => new { Key = loc.Key, Code = lang.Code })
.Except(context.Languages.Join(context.Localizations, lang => lang.Id,
loc => loc.LanguageId, (lang, loc) => new { Key = loc.Key, Code = lang.Code }))
.GroupBy(r => r.Key).Select(r => new LocalizationKeyWithMissingCodes
{
Key = r.Key,
MissingCodes = r.Select(kc => kc.Code).ToList()
})
.ToList()
.OrderByDescending(lkmc => lkmc.MissingCodes.Count())
.ThenBy(lkmc => lkmc.Key).ToList();
p.s. i typed this LINQ query on the go, so let me know if it has syntax issues..
the gist of the query is that we take a cartesian product and subtract matching rows.

Inverting a Hierarchy with Linq

Given the class
public class Article
{
public string Title { get; set; }
public List<string> Tags { get; set; }
}
and
List<Article> articles;
How can I create a "map" from individual tags (that may be associated with 1 or more articles) with Linq?
Dictionary<string, List<Article>> articlesPerTag;
I know that I can select all of the tags like this
var allTags = articlesPerTag.SelectMany(a => a.Tags);
However, I'm not sure how to associate back from each selected tag to the article it originated from.
I know I can write this conventionally along the lines of
Dictionary<string, List<Article>> map = new Dictionary<string, List<Article>>();
foreach (var a in articles)
{
foreach (var t in a.Tags)
{
List<Article> articlesForTag;
bool found = map.TryGetValue(t, out articlesForTag);
if (found)
articlesForTag.Add(a);
else
map.Add(t, new List<Article>() { a });
}
}
but I would like to understand how to accomplish this with Linq.

If you specifically need it as a dictionary from tags to articles, you could use something like this.
var map = articles.SelectMany(a => a.Tags.Select(t => new { t, a }))
.GroupBy(x => x.t, x => x.a)
.ToDictionary(g => g.Key, g => g.ToList());
Though it would be more efficient to use a lookup instead, it's precisely what you are trying to build up.
var lookup = articles.SelectMany(a => a.Tags.Select(t => new { t, a }))
.ToLookup(x => x.t, x => x.a);

One more way using GroupBy. A bit complicated though.
articles.SelectMany(article => article.Tags)
.Distinct()
.GroupBy(tag => tag, tag => articles.Where(a => a.Tags.Contains(tag)))
.ToDictionary(group => group.Key,
group => group.ToList().Aggregate((x, y) => x.Concat(y).Distinct()));

Improving conversion from List to List<Dictionary<string,string>> with Linq

I've a Key/Value table in my DB and I would return a List of Dictionary.
The following code works fine for me but with a lot of data is not performing.
note: r.name doesn't contains unique value
List<Dictionary<string, string>> listOutput = null;
using (ExampleDB db = new ExampleDB())
{
var result = (from r in db.FormField
where r.Form_id == 1
select new { r.ResponseId, r.name, r.value}).toList();
listOutput = new List<Dictionary<string, string>>();
foreach (var element in result)
{
listOutput.Add((from x in listOutput
where x.ResponseId == element.ResponseId
select x).ToDictionary(x => x.name, x => x.value));
}
}
return listOutput;
Do you have suggestions on how to improve this code ?

I suspect you want something like:
List<Dictionary<string, string>> result;
using (var db = new ExampleDB())
{
result = db.FormField
.Where(r => r.Form_id == 1)
.GroupBy(r => r.ResponseId, r => new { r.name, r.value })
.AsEnumerable()
.Select(g => g.ToDictionary(p => p.name, p => p.value))
.ToList();
}
In other words, we're filtering so that r.Form_id == 1, then grouping by ResponseId... taking all the name/value pairs associated with each ID and creating a dictionary from those name/value pairs.
Note that you're losing the ResponseId in the list of dictionaries - you can't tell which dictionary corresponds to which response ID.
The AsEnumerable part is to make sure that the last Select is performed using LINQ to Objects, rather than trying to convert it into SQL. It's possible that it would work without the AsEnumerable, but it will depend on your provider at the very least.

From what I gather you're trying to create a list of Key/Value pairs based on each ResponseId. Try GroupBy:
var output = result.GroupBy(r => r.ResponseId)
.Select(r => r.ToDictionary(s => s.Name, s => s.Value));
This will return an IEnumerable<Dictionary<string,string>>, which you can ToList if you actually need a list.

The type of the arguments cannot be inferred usage Linq GroupJoin

I'm trying to make a linq GroupJoin, and I receive the fore mentioned error. This is the code
public Dictionary<string, List<QuoteOrderline>> GetOrderlines(List<string> quoteNrs)
{
var quoteHeadersIds = portalDb.nquote_orderheaders
.Where(f => quoteNrs.Contains(f.QuoteOrderNumber))
.Select(f => f.ID).ToList();
List<nquote_orderlines> orderlines = portalDb.nquote_orderlines
.Where(f => quoteHeadersIds.Contains(f.QuoteHeaderID))
.ToList();
var toRet = quoteNrs
.GroupJoin(orderlines, q => q, o => o.QuoteHeaderID, (q => o) => new
{
quoteId = q,
orderlines = o.Select(g => new QuoteOrderline()
{
Description = g.Description,
ExtPrice = g.UnitPrice * g.Qty,
IsInOrder = g.IsInOrder,
PartNumber = g.PartNo,
Price = g.UnitPrice,
ProgramId = g.ProgramId,
Quantity = (int)g.Qty,
SKU = g.SKU
}).ToList()
});
}

I suspect this is the immediate problem:
(q => o) => new { ... }
I suspect you meant:
(q, o) => new { ... }
In other words, "here's a function taking a query and an order, and returning an anonymous type". The first syntax simply doesn't make sense - even thinking about higher ordered functions, you'd normally have q => o => ... rather than (q => o) => ....
Now that won't be enough on its own... because GroupJoin doesn't return a dictionary. (Indeed, you don't even have a return statement yet.) You'll need a ToDictionary call after that. Alternatively, it may well be more appropriate to return an ILookup<string, QuoteOrderLine> via ToLookup.