Finding prime numbers with the Sieve of Eratosthenes (Originally: Is there a better way to prepare this array?)

Question

Note: Version 2, below, uses the Sieve of Eratosthenes. There are several answers that helped with what I originally asked. I have chosen the Sieve of Era

Answer 1

Not sure if this will suite your situation but you can take a look at my approach. I used mine using Sieve of Eratosthenes.

  public static List<Integer> sieves(int n) {
        Map<Integer,Boolean> numbers = new LinkedHashMap<>();

        List<Integer> primes = new ArrayList<>();

        //First generate a list of integers from 2 to 30
        for(int i=2; i<n;i++){
            numbers.put(i,true);
        }

        for(int i : numbers.keySet()){
            /**
             * The first number in the list is 2; cross out every 2nd number in the list after 2 by 
             * counting up from 2 in increments of 2 (these will be all the multiples of 2 in the list):
             * 
             * The next number in the list after 2 is 3; cross out every 3rd number in the list after 3 by 
             * counting up from 3 in increments of 3 (these will be all the multiples of 3 in the list):
             * The next number not yet crossed out in the list after 5 is 7; the next step would be to cross out every
             * 7th number in the list after 7, but they are all already crossed out at this point,
             * as these numbers (14, 21, 28) are also multiples of smaller primes because 7 × 7 is greater than 30. 
             * The numbers not crossed out at this point in the list are all the prime numbers below 30:
             */
            if(numbers.get(i)){
                for(int j = i+i; j<n; j+=i) {
                    numbers.put(j,false);
                }
            }
        }


        for(int i : numbers.keySet()){
            for(int j = i+i; j<n && numbers.get(i); j+=i) {
                numbers.put(j,false);
            }
        }

        for(int i : numbers.keySet()){
           if(numbers.get(i)) {
               primes.add(i);
           }
        }
        return primes;
    }

Added comment for each steps that has been illustrated in wikipedia

Answer 2

Algo using Sieve of Eratosthenes

public static List<Integer> findPrimes(int limit) {

    List<Integer> list = new ArrayList<>();

    boolean [] isComposite = new boolean [limit + 1]; // limit + 1 because we won't use '0'th index of the array
    isComposite[1] = true;

    // Mark all composite numbers
    for (int i = 2; i <= limit; i++) {
        if (!isComposite[i]) {
            // 'i' is a prime number
            list.add(i);
            int multiple = 2;
            while (i * multiple <= limit) {
                isComposite [i * multiple] = true;
                multiple++;
            }
        }
    }

    return list;
}

Image depicting the above algo (Grey color cells represent prime number. Since we consider all numbers as prime numbers intially, the whole is grid is grey initially.)

Image Source: WikiMedia

Answer 3

I have done using HashMap and found it very simple

import java.util.HashMap;
import java.util.Map;

/*Using Algorithms such as sieve of Eratosthanas */

public class PrimeNumber {

    public static void main(String[] args) {

        int prime = 15;
        HashMap<Integer, Integer> hashMap = new HashMap<Integer, Integer>();

        hashMap.put(0, 0);
        hashMap.put(1, 0);
        for (int i = 2; i <= prime; i++) {

            hashMap.put(i, 1);// Assuming all numbers are prime
        }

        printPrimeNumberEratoshanas(hashMap, prime);

    }

    private static void printPrimeNumberEratoshanas(HashMap<Integer, Integer> hashMap, int prime) {

        System.out.println("Printing prime numbers upto" + prime + ".....");
        for (Map.Entry<Integer, Integer> entry : hashMap.entrySet()) {
            if (entry.getValue().equals(1)) {
                System.out.println(entry.getKey());
                for (int j = entry.getKey(); j < prime; j++) {
                    for (int k = j; k * j <= prime; k++) {
                        hashMap.put(j * k, 0);
                    }
                }

            }
        }

    }

}

Think this is effective

Answer 4

As Paul Tomblin points out, there are better algorithms.

But keeping with what you have, and assuming an object per result is too big:

You are only ever appending to the array. So, use a relatively small int[] array. When it's full use append it to a List and create a replacement. At the end copy it into a correctly sized array.

Alternatively, guess the size of the int[] array. If it is too small, replace by an int[] with a size a fraction larger than the current array size. The performance overhead of this will remain proportional to the size. (This was discussed briefly in a recent stackoverflow podcast.)

Answer 5

public static void primes(int n) {
        boolean[] lista = new boolean[n+1];
        for (int i=2;i<lista.length;i++) {
            if (lista[i]==false) {
                System.out.print(i + " ");
            }
            for (int j=i+i;j<lista.length;j+=i) {
                lista[j]=true;
            }
        }
    }

Answer 6

Your method of finding primes, by comparing every single element of the array with every possible factor is hideously inefficient. You can improve it immensely by doing a Sieve of Eratosthenes over the entire array at once. Besides doing far fewer comparisons, it also uses addition rather than division. Division is way slower.