Three way partitioning of an array around a given range

07 Jul, 2022
Given an array and a range [lowVal, highVal], partition the array around the range such that array is divided in three parts. 
All elements smaller than lowVal come first. All elements in range lowVal to highVal come next. All elements greater than highVal appear in the end. 
All elements smaller than lowVal come first. 
All elements in range lowVal to highVal come next. 
All elements greater than highVal appear in the end. 
The individual elements of three sets can appear in any order.
Examples: 
Input: arr[] = {1, 14, 5, 20, 4, 2, 54, 20, 87, 98, 3, 1, 32}  
        lowVal = 14, highVal = 20
Output: arr[] = {1, 5, 4, 2, 1, 3, 14, 20, 20, 98, 87, 32, 54}

Input: arr[] = {1, 14, 5, 20, 4, 2, 54, 20, 87, 98, 3, 1, 32}  
       lowVal = 20, highVal = 20       
Output: arr[] = {1, 14, 5, 4, 2, 1, 3, 20, 20, 98, 87, 32, 54} 
A simple solution is to sort the array. This solution does a lot of extra rearrangements and requires O(n Log n) time.
An efficient solution is based on Dutch National Flag based QuickSort. We traverse given array elements from left. We keep track of two pointers, first (called start in the code below) to store next position of smaller element (smaller than range) from beginning; and second (called end in the code below) to store next position of greater element from end. 
Implementation:
C++
Java
Python3
C#
Javascript
// C++ program to implement three way partitioning// around a given range.#include<iostream>using namespace std; // Partitions arr[0..n-1] around [lowVal..highVal]void threeWayPartition(int arr[], int n,                int lowVal, int highVal){    // Initialize next available positions for    // smaller (than range) and greater elements    int start = 0, end = n-1;     // Traverse elements from left    for (int i=0; i<=end;)    {        // If current element is smaller than        // range, put it on next available smaller        // position.        if (arr[i] < lowVal)        {          //if i and start are same in that case we can't swap          //swap only if i is greater than start          if(i==start)          {            start++;            i++;          }          else            swap(arr[i++], arr[start++]);        }         // If current element is greater than        // range, put it on next available greater        // position.        else if (arr[i] > highVal)            swap(arr[i], arr[end--]);         else            i++;    }} // Driver codeint main(){    int arr[] = {1, 14, 5, 20, 4, 2, 54, 20, 87,                98, 3, 1, 32};    int n = sizeof(arr)/sizeof(arr[0]);     threeWayPartition(arr, n, 10, 20);     cout << "Modified array \n";    for (int i=0; i<n; i++)        cout << arr[i] << " ";}
// Java program to implement three way partitioning// around a given range.import java.io.*; class GFG{         // Partitions arr[0..n-1] around [lowVal..highVal]    public static void threeWayPartition(int[] arr, int lowVal, int highVal)    {                 int  n = arr.length;                 // Initialize ext available positions for        // smaller (than range) and greater elements        int start = 0, end = n-1;                  // Traverse elements from left        for(int i = 0; i <= end;)        {                         // If current element is smaller than            // range, put it on next available smaller            // position.                         if(arr[i] < lowVal)            {                                 int temp = arr[start];                arr[start] = arr[i];                arr[i] = temp;                start++;                i++;                             }                         // If current element is greater than            // range, put it on next available greater            // position.            else if(arr[i] > highVal)            {                                 int temp = arr[end];                arr[end] = arr[i];                arr[i] = temp;                end--;                              }                         else               i++;        }             }         public static void main (String[] args)    {                  int arr[] = {1, 14, 5, 20, 4, 2, 54, 20, 87, 98, 3, 1, 32};                 threeWayPartition(arr, 10, 20);          System.out.println("Modified array ");        for (int i=0; i < arr.length; i++)        {            System.out.print(arr[i] + " ");             }       }} //This code is contributed by Dheerendra Singh
# Python3 program to implement three way# partitioning around a given range. # Partitions arr[0..n-1] around [lowVal..highVal]def threeWayPartition(arr, n, lowVal, highVal):     # Initialize ext available positions for    # smaller (than range) and greater elements    start = 0    end = n - 1    i = 0     # Traverse elements from left    while i <= end:         # If current element is smaller than        # range, put it on next available smaller        # position.        if arr[i] < lowVal:              arr[i], arr[start] = arr[start], arr[i]            i += 1            start += 1         # If current element is greater than        # range, put it on next available greater        # position.        elif arr[i] > highVal:              arr[i], arr[end] = arr[end], arr[i]            end -= 1         else:            i += 1 # Driver codeif __name__ == "__main__":    arr = [1, 14, 5, 20, 4, 2, 54,           20, 87, 98, 3, 1, 32]    n = len(arr)     threeWayPartition(arr, n, 10, 20)     print("Modified array")    for i in range(n):        print(arr[i], end = " ") # This code is contributed by# sanjeev2552
// C# program to implement three way// partitioning around a given range.using System; class GFG {     // Partitions arr[0..n-1]    // around [lowVal..highVal]    public static void threeWayPartition(int[] arr,                           int lowVal, int highVal)    {        int n = arr.Length;         // Initialize ext available positions for        // smaller (than range) and greater elements        int start = 0, end = n - 1;         // Traverse elements from left        for (int i = 0; i <= end;) {             // If current element is smaller than            // range, put it on next available smaller            // position.             if (arr[i] < lowVal) {                 int temp = arr[start];                arr[start] = arr[i];                arr[i] = temp;                start++;                i++;            }             // If current element is greater than            // range, put it on next available greater            // position.            else if (arr[i] > highVal) {                 int temp = arr[end];                arr[end] = arr[i];                arr[i] = temp;                end--;            }             else                i++;        }    }         // Driver code    public static void Main()    {        int[] arr = { 1, 14, 5, 20, 4, 2, 54,                      20, 87, 98, 3, 1, 32 };         threeWayPartition(arr, 10, 20);         Console.WriteLine("Modified array ");        for (int i = 0; i < arr.Length; i++) {            Console.Write(arr[i] + " ");        }    }} // This article is contributed by vt_m.
<script> // JavaScript program to implement three// way partitioning around a given range. // Partitions arr[0..n-1] around [lowVal..highVal]function threeWayPartition(arr, n, lowVal, highVal){         // Initialize ext available positions for    // smaller (than range) and greater elements    let start = 0, end = n - 1;     // Traverse elements from left    for(let i = 0; i <= end;)    {                 // If current element is smaller than        // range, put it on next available smaller        // position.        if (arr[i] < lowVal)        {             let temp = arr[start];            arr[start] = arr[i];            arr[i] = temp;            start++;            i++;        }         // If current element is greater than        // range, put it on next available greater        // position.        else if(arr[i] > highVal)        {                let temp = arr[end];            arr[end] = arr[i];            arr[i] = temp;            end--;        }        else            i++;    }} // Driver codelet arr = [ 1, 14, 5, 20, 4, 2, 54,            20, 87, 98, 3, 1, 32 ];let n = arr.length; threeWayPartition(arr, n, 10, 20); document.write("Modified array <br>");for(let i = 0; i < n; i++)    document.write(arr[i] + " "); // This code is contributed by Surbhi Tyagi. </script>
Modified array 
1 5 4 2 1 3 14 20 20 98 87 32 54 
Time Complexity: O(n) Auxiliary Space: O(1)
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