Reverse / invert a dictionary mapping

Question

Given a dictionary like so:

my_map = {\'a\': 1, \'b\': 2}

How can one invert this map to get:

inv_map = {1: \'a\', 2: \'b\'         


        

Answer 1

I think the best way to do this is to define a class. Here is an implementation of a "symmetric dictionary":

class SymDict:
    def __init__(self):
        self.aToB = {}
        self.bToA = {}

    def assocAB(self, a, b):
        # Stores and returns a tuple (a,b) of overwritten bindings
        currB = None
        if a in self.aToB: currB = self.bToA[a]
        currA = None
        if b in self.bToA: currA = self.aToB[b]

        self.aToB[a] = b
        self.bToA[b] = a
        return (currA, currB)

    def lookupA(self, a):
        if a in self.aToB:
            return self.aToB[a]
        return None

    def lookupB(self, b):
        if b in self.bToA:
            return self.bToA[b]
        return None

Deletion and iteration methods are easy enough to implement if they're needed.

This implementation is way more efficient than inverting an entire dictionary (which seems to be the most popular solution on this page). Not to mention, you can add or remove values from your SymDict as much as you want, and your inverse-dictionary will always stay valid -- this isn't true if you simply reverse the entire dictionary once.