C#: Remove duplicate values from dictionary?

Question

How can I create a dictionary with no duplicate values from a dictionary that may have duplicate values?

IDictionary<string, string> myDict = new Dictionary<string, string>();

myDict.Add("1", "blue");
myDict.Add("2", "blue");
myDict.Add("3", "red");
myDict.Add("4", "green");


uniqueValueDict = myDict.???

Edit:

-I don't care which key is kept. - Is there something using Distinct() operation?

Answer 1

I think you need to give more information about the behavior of the unique-making function. For blue, which key should it keep, 1 or 2?

Answer 2

What do you want to do with the duplicates? If you don't mind which key you lose, just build another dictionary like this:

IDictionary<string, string> myDict = new Dictionary<string, string>();

myDict.Add("1", "blue");
myDict.Add("2", "blue");
myDict.Add("3", "red");
myDict.Add("4", "green");

HashSet<string> knownValues = new HashSet<string>();
Dictionary<string, string> uniqueValues = new Dictionary<string, string>();

foreach (var pair in myDict)
{
    if (knownValues.Add(pair.Value))
    {
        uniqueValues.Add(pair.Key, pair.Value);
    }
}

That assumes you're using .NET 3.5, admittedly. Let me know if you need a .NET 2.0 solution.

Here's a LINQ-based solution which I find pleasantly compact...

var uniqueValues = myDict.GroupBy(pair => pair.Value)
                         .Select(group => group.First())
                         .ToDictionary(pair => pair.Key, pair => pair.Value);

Answer 3

foreach (var key in mydict.Keys)
  tempdict[mydict[key]] = key;
foreach (var value in tempdict.Keys)
  uniquedict[tempdict[value]] = value;

Answer 4

The brute-force solution would be something like the following

var result = dictionary
    .GroupBy(kvp => kvp.Value)
    .ToDictionary(grp => grp.First().Value, grp.Key)

assuming you don't really care about the key used to represent a group of duplicates and it is acceptable to rebuild the dictionary.

Answer 5

Dictionary<string, string> test = new Dictionary<string,string>();
test.Add("1", "blue");
test.Add("2", "blue");
test.Add("3", "green");
test.Add("4", "red");
Dictionary<string, string> test2 = new Dictionary<string, string>();
foreach (KeyValuePair<string, string> entry in test)
{
    if (!test2.ContainsValue(entry.Value))
        test2.Add(entry.Key, entry.Value);
}

Answer 6

Jon beat me to the .NET 3.5 solution, but this should work if you need a .NET 2.0 solution:

        List<string> vals = new List<string>();
        Dictionary<string, string> newDict = new Dictionary<string, string>();
        foreach (KeyValuePair<string, string> item in myDict)
        {
            if (!vals.Contains(item.Value))
            {
                newDict.Add(item.Key, item.Value);
                vals.Add(item.Value);
            }
        }

Answer 7

http://www.codeproject.com/KB/linq/Unique.aspx