Split List into Sublists with LINQ

Question

Is there any way I can separate a List<SomeObject> into several separate lists of SomeObject, using the item index as the delimiter of each split?

Let me exemplify:

I have a List<SomeObject> and I need a List<List<SomeObject>> or List<SomeObject>[], so that each of these resulting lists will contain a group of 3 items of the original list (sequentially).

eg.:

• Original List: [a, g, e, w, p, s, q, f, x, y, i, m, c]

• Resulting lists: [a, g, e], [w, p, s], [q, f, x], [y, i, m], [c]

I'd also need the resulting lists size to be a parameter of this function.

Answer 1

If the list is of type system.collections.generic you can use the "CopyTo" method available to copy elements of your array to other sub arrays. You specify the start element and number of elements to copy.

You could also make 3 clones of your original list and use the "RemoveRange" on each list to shrink the list to the size you want.

Or just create a helper method to do it for you.

Answer 2

This is an old question but this is what I ended up with; it enumerates the enumerable only once, but does create lists for each of the partitions. It doesn't suffer from unexpected behavior when ToArray() is called as some of the implementations do:

    public static IEnumerable<IEnumerable<T>> Partition<T>(IEnumerable<T> source, int chunkSize)
    {
        if (source == null)
        {
            throw new ArgumentNullException("source");
        }

        if (chunkSize < 1)
        {
            throw new ArgumentException("Invalid chunkSize: " + chunkSize);
        }

        using (IEnumerator<T> sourceEnumerator = source.GetEnumerator())
        {
            IList<T> currentChunk = new List<T>();
            while (sourceEnumerator.MoveNext())
            {
                currentChunk.Add(sourceEnumerator.Current);
                if (currentChunk.Count == chunkSize)
                {
                    yield return currentChunk;
                    currentChunk = new List<T>();
                }
            }

            if (currentChunk.Any())
            {
                yield return currentChunk;
            }
        }
    }

Answer 3

I took the primary answer and made it to be an IOC container to determine where to split. (For who is really looking to only split on 3 items, in reading this post while searching for an answer?)

This method allows one to split on any type of item as needed.

public static List<List<T>> SplitOn<T>(List<T> main, Func<T, bool> splitOn)
{
    int groupIndex = 0;

    return main.Select( item => new 
                             { 
                               Group = (splitOn.Invoke(item) ? ++groupIndex : groupIndex), 
                               Value = item 
                             })
                .GroupBy( it2 => it2.Group)
                .Select(x => x.Select(v => v.Value).ToList())
                .ToList();
}

---

So for the OP the code would be

var it = new List<string>()
                       { "a", "g", "e", "w", "p", "s", "q", "f", "x", "y", "i", "m", "c" };

int index = 0; 
var result = SplitOn(it, (itm) => (index++ % 3) == 0 );

Answer 4

Ok, here's my take on it:

• completely lazy: works on infinite enumerables
• no intermediate copying/buffering
• O(n) execution time
• works also when inner sequences are only partially consumed

public static IEnumerable<IEnumerable<T>> Chunks<T>(this IEnumerable<T> enumerable,
                                                    int chunkSize)
{
    if (chunkSize < 1) throw new ArgumentException("chunkSize must be positive");

    using (var e = enumerable.GetEnumerator())
    while (e.MoveNext())
    {
        var remaining = chunkSize;    // elements remaining in the current chunk
        var innerMoveNext = new Func<bool>(() => --remaining > 0 && e.MoveNext());

        yield return e.GetChunk(innerMoveNext);
        while (innerMoveNext()) {/* discard elements skipped by inner iterator */}
    }
}

private static IEnumerable<T> GetChunk<T>(this IEnumerator<T> e,
                                          Func<bool> innerMoveNext)
{
    do yield return e.Current;
    while (innerMoveNext());
}

Example Usage

var src = new [] {1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6}; 

var c3 = src.Chunks(3);      // {{1, 2, 3}, {4, 5, 6}}; 
var c4 = src.Chunks(4);      // {{1, 2, 3, 4}, {5, 6}}; 

var sum   = c3.Select(c => c.Sum());    // {6, 15}
var count = c3.Count();                 // 2
var take2 = c3.Select(c => c.Take(2));  // {{1, 2}, {4, 5}}

Explanations

The code works by nesting two yield based iterators.

The outer iterator must keep track of how many elements have been effectively consumed by the inner (chunk) iterator. This is done by closing over remaining with innerMoveNext(). Unconsumed elements of a chunk are discarded before the next chunk is yielded by the outer iterator. This is necessary because otherwise you get inconsistent results, when the inner enumerables are not (completely) consumed (e.g. c3.Count() would return 6).

Note: The answer has been updated to address the shortcomings pointed out by @aolszowka.

Answer 5

Just putting in my two cents. If you wanted to "bucket" the list (visualize left to right), you could do the following:

 public static List<List<T>> Buckets<T>(this List<T> source, int numberOfBuckets)
    {
        List<List<T>> result = new List<List<T>>();
        for (int i = 0; i < numberOfBuckets; i++)
        {
            result.Add(new List<T>());
        }

        int count = 0;
        while (count < source.Count())
        {
            var mod = count % numberOfBuckets;
            result[mod].Add(source[count]);
            count++;
        }
        return result;
    }

Answer 6

Try the following code.

public static IList<IList<T>> Split<T>(IList<T> source)
{
    return  source
        .Select((x, i) => new { Index = i, Value = x })
        .GroupBy(x => x.Index / 3)
        .Select(x => x.Select(v => v.Value).ToList())
        .ToList();
}

The idea is to first group the elements by indexes. Dividing by three has the effect of grouping them into groups of 3. Then convert each group to a list and the IEnumerable of List to a List of Lists