xref: /netbsd-src/lib/libc/stdlib/radixsort.3 (revision 2a399c6883d870daece976daec6ffa7bb7f934ce)
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34.\"     from: @(#)radixsort.3	8.2 (Berkeley) 1/27/94
35.\"
36.Dd January 27, 1994
37.Dt RADIXSORT 3
38.Os
39.Sh NAME
40.Nm radixsort
41.Nd radix sort
42.Sh SYNOPSIS
43.Fd #include <limits.h>
44.Fd #include <stdlib.h>
45.Ft int
46.Fn radixsort "u_char **base" "int nmemb" "u_char *table" "u_int endbyte"
47.Ft int
48.Fn sradixsort "u_char **base" "int nmemb" "u_char *table" "u_int endbyte"
49.Sh DESCRIPTION
50The
51.Fn radixsort
52and
53.Fn sradixsort
54functions
55are implementations of radix sort.
56.Pp
57These functions sort an array of pointers to byte strings, the initial
58member of which is referenced by
59.Fa base .
60The byte strings may contain any values; the end of each string
61is denoted by the user-specified value
62.Fa endbyte .
63.Pp
64Applications may specify a sort order by providing the
65.Fa table
66argument.
67If
68.Pf non- Dv NULL ,
69.Fa table
70must reference an array of
71.Dv UCHAR_MAX
72+ 1 bytes which contains the sort
73weight of each possible byte value.
74The end-of-string byte must have a sort weight of 0 or 255
75(for sorting in reverse order).
76More than one byte may have the same sort weight.
77The
78.Fa table
79argument
80is useful for applications which wish to sort different characters
81equally, for example, providing a table with the same weights
82for A-Z as for a-z will result in a case-insensitive sort.
83If
84.Fa table
85is NULL, the contents of the array are sorted in ascending order
86according to the
87.Tn ASCII
88order of the byte strings they reference and
89.Fa endbyte
90has a sorting weight of 0.
91.Pp
92The
93.Fn sradixsort
94function is stable, that is, if two elements compare as equal, their
95order in the sorted array is unchanged.
96The
97.Fn sradixsort
98function uses additional memory sufficient to hold
99.Fa nmemb
100pointers.
101.Pp
102The
103.Fn radixsort
104function is not stable, but uses no additional memory.
105.Pp
106These functions are variants of most-significant-byte radix sorting; in
107particular, see D.E. Knuth's Algorithm R and section 5.2.5, exercise 10.
108They take linear time relative to the number of bytes in the strings.
109.Sh RETURN VALUES
110Upon successful completion 0 is returned.
111Otherwise, \-1 is returned and the global variable
112.Va errno
113is set to indicate the error.
114.Sh ERRORS
115.Bl -tag -width Er
116.It Bq Er EINVAL
117The value of the
118.Fa endbyte
119element of
120.Fa table
121is not 0 or 255.
122.El
123.Pp
124Additionally, the
125.Fn sradixsort
126function
127may fail and set
128.Va errno
129for any of the errors specified for the library routine
130.Xr malloc 3 .
131.Sh SEE ALSO
132.Xr sort 1 ,
133.Xr qsort 3
134.Pp
135.Rs
136.%A Knuth, D.E.
137.%D 1968
138.%B "The Art of Computer Programming"
139.%T "Sorting and Searching"
140.%V Vol. 3
141.%P pp. 170-178
142.Re
143.Rs
144.%A Paige, R.
145.%D 1987
146.%T "Three Partition Refinement Algorithms"
147.%J "SIAM J. Comput."
148.%V Vol. 16
149.%N No. 6
150.Re
151.Rs
152.%A McIlroy, P.
153.%D 1993
154.%B "Engineering Radix Sort"
155.%T "Computing Systems"
156.%V Vol. 6:1
157.%P pp. 5-27
158.Re
159.Sh HISTORY
160The
161.Fn radixsort
162function first appeared in 4.4BSD.
163