Find intersection of two nested lists?

Question

I know how to get an intersection of two flat lists:

b1 = [1,2,3,4,5,9,11,15]
b2 = [4,5,6,7,8]
b3 = [val for val in b1 if val in b2]

or

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Answer 1

Simple way to find difference and intersection between iterables

Use this method if repetition matters

from collections import Counter

def intersection(a, b):
    """
    Find the intersection of two iterables

    >>> intersection((1,2,3), (2,3,4))
    (2, 3)

    >>> intersection((1,2,3,3), (2,3,3,4))
    (2, 3, 3)

    >>> intersection((1,2,3,3), (2,3,4,4))
    (2, 3)

    >>> intersection((1,2,3,3), (2,3,4,4))
    (2, 3)
    """
    return tuple(n for n, count in (Counter(a) & Counter(b)).items() for _ in range(count))

def difference(a, b):
    """
    Find the symmetric difference of two iterables

    >>> difference((1,2,3), (2,3,4))
    (1, 4)

    >>> difference((1,2,3,3), (2,3,4))
    (1, 3, 4)

    >>> difference((1,2,3,3), (2,3,4,4))
    (1, 3, 4, 4)
    """
    diff = lambda x, y: tuple(n for n, count in (Counter(x) - Counter(y)).items() for _ in range(count))
    return diff(a, b) + diff(b, a)

Answer 2

If you want:

c1 = [1, 6, 7, 10, 13, 28, 32, 41, 58, 63]
c2 = [[13, 17, 18, 21, 32], [7, 11, 13, 14, 28], [1, 5, 6, 8, 15, 16]]
c3 = [[13, 32], [7, 13, 28], [1,6]]

Then here is your solution for Python 2:

c3 = [filter(lambda x: x in c1, sublist) for sublist in c2]

In Python 3 filter returns an iterable instead of list, so you need to wrap filter calls with list():

c3 = [list(filter(lambda x: x in c1, sublist)) for sublist in c2]

Explanation:

The filter part takes each sublist's item and checks to see if it is in the source list c1. The list comprehension is executed for each sublist in c2.

Answer 3

Since intersect was defined, a basic list comprehension is enough:

>>> c3 = [intersect(c1, i) for i in c2]
>>> c3
[[32, 13], [28, 13, 7], [1, 6]]

Improvement thanks to S. Lott's remark and TM.'s associated remark:

>>> c3 = [list(set(c1).intersection(i)) for i in c2]
>>> c3
[[32, 13], [28, 13, 7], [1, 6]]

Answer 4

c1 = [1, 6, 7, 10, 13, 28, 32, 41, 58, 63]

c2 = [[13, 17, 18, 21, 32], [7, 11, 13, 14, 28], [1, 5, 6, 8, 15, 16]]

c3 = [list(set(c2[i]).intersection(set(c1))) for i in xrange(len(c2))]

c3
->[[32, 13], [28, 13, 7], [1, 6]]

Answer 5

We can use set methods for this:

c1 = [1, 6, 7, 10, 13, 28, 32, 41, 58, 63]
c2 = [[13, 17, 18, 21, 32], [7, 11, 13, 14, 28], [1, 5, 6, 8, 15, 16]]

   result = [] 
   for li in c2:
       res = set(li) & set(c1)
       result.append(list(res))

   print result

Answer 6

# Problem:  Given c1 and c2:
c1 = [1, 6, 7, 10, 13, 28, 32, 41, 58, 63]
c2 = [[13, 17, 18, 21, 32], [7, 11, 13, 14, 28], [1, 5, 6, 8, 15, 16]]
# how do you get c3 to be [[13, 32], [7, 13, 28], [1, 6]] ?

Here's one way to set c3 that doesn't involve sets:

c3 = []
for sublist in c2:
    c3.append([val for val in c1 if val in sublist])

But if you prefer to use just one line, you can do this:

c3 = [[val for val in c1 if val in sublist]  for sublist in c2]

It's a list comprehension inside a list comprehension, which is a little unusual, but I think you shouldn't have too much trouble following it.