Efficient way to implement Priority Queue in Javascript?

Question

Priority Queues have a priority value and data, for every entry.

Thus, when adding a new element to the queue, it bubbles up to the surface if it has a higher priori

Answer 1

Below is what I believe to be a truly efficient version of a PriorityQueue which uses an array-based binary heap (where the root is at index 0, and the children of a node at index i are at indices 2i + 1 and 2i + 2, respectively).

This implementation includes the classical priority queue methods like push, peek, pop, and size, as well as convenience methods isEmpty and replace (the latter being a more efficient substitute for a pop followed immediately by a push). Values are stored not as [value, priority] pairs, but simply as values; this allows for automatic prioritization of types that can be natively compared using the > operator. A custom comparator function passed to the PriorityQueue constructor can be used to emulate the behavior of pairwise semantics, however, as shown in the example below.

Heap-based Implementation:

const top = 0;
const parent = i => ((i + 1) >>> 1) - 1;
const left = i => (i << 1) + 1;
const right = i => (i + 1) << 1;

class PriorityQueue {
  constructor(comparator = (a, b) => a > b) {
    this._heap = [];
    this._comparator = comparator;
  }
  size() {
    return this._heap.length;
  }
  isEmpty() {
    return this.size() == 0;
  }
  peek() {
    return this._heap[top];
  }
  push(...values) {
    values.forEach(value => {
      this._heap.push(value);
      this._siftUp();
    });
    return this.size();
  }
  pop() {
    const poppedValue = this.peek();
    const bottom = this.size() - 1;
    if (bottom > top) {
      this._swap(top, bottom);
    }
    this._heap.pop();
    this._siftDown();
    return poppedValue;
  }
  replace(value) {
    const replacedValue = this.peek();
    this._heap[top] = value;
    this._siftDown();
    return replacedValue;
  }
  _greater(i, j) {
    return this._comparator(this._heap[i], this._heap[j]);
  }
  _swap(i, j) {
    [this._heap[i], this._heap[j]] = [this._heap[j], this._heap[i]];
  }
  _siftUp() {
    let node = this.size() - 1;
    while (node > top && this._greater(node, parent(node))) {
      this._swap(node, parent(node));
      node = parent(node);
    }
  }
  _siftDown() {
    let node = top;
    while (
      (left(node) < this.size() && this._greater(left(node), node)) ||
      (right(node) < this.size() && this._greater(right(node), node))
    ) {
      let maxChild = (right(node) < this.size() && this._greater(right(node), left(node))) ? right(node) : left(node);
      this._swap(node, maxChild);
      node = maxChild;
    }
  }
}

---

Example:

{const top=0,parent=c=>(c+1>>>1)-1,left=c=>(c<<1)+1,right=c=>c+1<<1;class PriorityQueue{constructor(c=(d,e)=>d>e){this._heap=[],this._comparator=c}size(){return this._heap.length}isEmpty(){return 0==this.size()}peek(){return this._heap[top]}push(...c){return c.forEach(d=>{this._heap.push(d),this._siftUp()}),this.size()}pop(){const c=this.peek(),d=this.size()-1;return d>top&&this._swap(top,d),this._heap.pop(),this._siftDown(),c}replace(c){const d=this.peek();return this._heap[top]=c,this._siftDown(),d}_greater(c,d){return this._comparator(this._heap[c],this._heap[d])}_swap(c,d){[this._heap[c],this._heap[d]]=[this._heap[d],this._heap[c]]}_siftUp(){for(let c=this.size()-1;c>top&&this._greater(c,parent(c));)this._swap(c,parent(c)),c=parent(c)}_siftDown(){for(let d,c=top;left(c)<this.size()&&this._greater(left(c),c)||right(c)<this.size()&&this._greater(right(c),c);)d=right(c)<this.size()&&this._greater(right(c),left(c))?right(c):left(c),this._swap(c,d),c=d}}window.PriorityQueue=PriorityQueue}

// Default comparison semantics
const queue = new PriorityQueue();
queue.push(10, 20, 30, 40, 50);
console.log('Top:', queue.peek()); //=> 50
console.log('Size:', queue.size()); //=> 5
console.log('Contents:');
while (!queue.isEmpty()) {
  console.log(queue.pop()); //=> 40, 30, 20, 10
}

// Pairwise comparison semantics
const pairwiseQueue = new PriorityQueue((a, b) => a[1] > b[1]);
pairwiseQueue.push(['low', 0], ['medium', 5], ['high', 10]);
console.log('\nContents:');
while (!pairwiseQueue.isEmpty()) {
  console.log(pairwiseQueue.pop()[0]); //=> 'high', 'medium', 'low'
}

.as-console-wrapper{min-height:100%}

Answer 2

You should use standard libraries like e.g. the Closure Library (goog.structs.PriorityQueue):

https://google.github.io/closure-library/api/goog.structs.PriorityQueue.html

By clicking at the source code, you will know it is actually linking to goog.structs.Heap which you can follow:

https://github.com/google/closure-library/blob/master/closure/goog/structs/heap.js

Answer 3

I was not satisfied with the efficiency of existing priority queue implementations, so I decided to make my own:

https://github.com/luciopaiva/heapify

npm i heapify

This will run faster than any other publicly known implementation due to the use of typed arrays.

Works on both client and server ends, code base with 100% test coverage, tiny library (~100 LoC). Also, the interface is really simple. Here's some code:

import Heapify from "heapify";

const queue = new Heapify();
queue.push(1, 10);  // insert item with key=1, priority=10
queue.push(2, 5);  // insert item with key=2, priority=5
queue.pop();  // 2
queue.peek();  // 1
queue.peekPriority();  // 10