More elegant way to check for duplicates in C++ array?

Question

I wrote this code in C++ as part of a uni task where I need to ensure that there are no duplicates within an array:

// Check for duplicate numbers in user inputted data
    int i; // Need to declare i here so that it can be accessed by the 'inner' loop that starts on line 21
    for(i = 0;i < 6; i++) { // Check each other number in the array
        for(int j = i; j < 6; j++) { // Check the rest of the numbers
            if(j != i) { // Makes sure don't check number against itself
                if(userNumbers[i] == userNumbers[j]) {
                    b = true;
                }
            }
            if(b == true) { // If there is a duplicate, change that particular number
                cout << "Please re-enter number " << i + 1 << ". Duplicate numbers are not allowed:" << endl;
                cin >> userNumbers[i];
            }
        } // Comparison loop
        b = false; // Reset the boolean after each number entered has been checked
    } // Main check loop

It works perfectly, but I'd like to know if there is a more elegant or efficient way to check.

Answer 1

You can add all elements in a set and check when adding if it is already present or not. That would be more elegant and efficient.

Answer 2

You could sort the array in O(nlog(n)), then simply look until the next number. That is substantially faster than your O(n^2) existing algorithm. The code is also a lot cleaner. Your code also doesn't ensure no duplicates were inserted when they were re-entered. You need to prevent duplicates from existing in the first place.

std::sort(userNumbers.begin(), userNumbers.end());
for(int i = 0; i < userNumbers.size() - 1; i++) {
    if (userNumbers[i] == userNumbers[i + 1]) {
        userNumbers.erase(userNumbers.at(i))
        i--;
    }
}

I also second the reccomendation to use a std::set - no duplicates there.

Answer 3

It's ok, specially for small array lengths. I'd use more efficient aproaches (less than n^2/2 comparisons) if the array is mugh bigger - see DeadMG's answer.

Some small corrections for your code:

• Instead of int j = i writeint j = i +1 and you can omit your if(j != i) test
• You should't need to declare i variable outside the for statement.

Answer 4

Indeed, the fastest and as far I can see most elegant method is as advised above:

std::vector<int> tUserNumbers;
// ...
std::set<int> tSet(tUserNumbers.begin(), tUserNumbers.end());
std::vector<int>(tSet.begin(), tSet.end()).swap(tUserNumbers);

It is O(n log n). This however does not make it, if the ordering of the numbers in the input array needs to be kept... In this case I did:

    std::set<int> tTmp;
    std::vector<int>::iterator tNewEnd = 
        std::remove_if(tUserNumbers.begin(), tUserNumbers.end(), 
        [&tTmp] (int pNumber) -> bool {
            return (!tTmp.insert(pNumber).second);
    });
    tUserNumbers.erase(tNewEnd, tUserNumbers.end());

which is still O(n log n) and keeps the original ordering of elements in tUserNumbers.

Cheers,

Paul

Answer 5

The following solution is based on sorting the numbers and then removing the duplicates:

#include <algorithm>

int main()
{
    int userNumbers[6];

    // ...

    int* end = userNumbers + 6;
    std::sort(userNumbers, end);
    bool containsDuplicates = (std::unique(userNumbers, end) != end);
}

Answer 6

//std::unique(_copy) requires a sorted container.
std::sort(cont.begin(), cont.end());

//testing if cont has duplicates
std::unique(cont.begin(), cont.end()) != cont.end();

//getting a new container with no duplicates
std::unique_copy(cont.begin(), cont.end(), std::back_inserter(cont2));