Simple Problem but tough for me if i want it in linear time

[Peter Otten]

ChrisChia wrote:

> dataList = [a, b, c, ...]
> where a, b, c are objects of a Class X.
> In Class X, it contains self.name and self.number
> 
> If i wish to test whether a number (let's say 100) appears in one of
> the object, and return that object,
> is that only fast way of solving this problem without iterating
> through every object to see the number value?
> 
> dataList.__contains__ can only check my object instance name...
> anyone can solve this in linear complexity?

Well, iteration as in 

next(item for item in dataList if item.number == 100) 

is O(n) and list.__contains__() has no magic way to do better. If you need 
O(1) lookup you can use a dict or collections.defaultdict that maps 
item.number to a list (or set) of X instances:

lookup = {}
for item in dataList:
    lookup.setdefault(item.number, []).append(item)

print lookup[100]


Peter