std::set_union vector<pair<string,string>>

Question

I want to compute the union between two vectors:

std::vector<pair<string,string>> p1;

std::vector<pair<string,string>> p2;

The problem is that why is the union being done on the second element instead of first? the size of the union should be equal to 4 . Is it possible to modify set_union so that the Union is done on the first element?

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#include <iostream>
#include <algorithm>
#include <vector>

using namespace std;
int main()
{
    std::vector<pair<string,string>> p1;
    std::vector<pair<string,string>> p2;
    p1.push_back(make_pair("A","1"));
    p1.push_back(make_pair("B","2"));
    p1.push_back(make_pair("C","3"));;
    p2.push_back(make_pair("A","4"));
    p2.push_back(make_pair("B","5"));
    p2.push_back(make_pair("C","6"));
    p2.push_back(make_pair("D","7"));
    //sort vectors according to first element
    sort(p1.begin(), p1.end(), [](const pair<string,string>& lhs, const pair<string,string>& rhs) {return lhs.first < rhs.first; });
    sort(p2.begin(), p2.end(), [](const pair<string,string>& lhs, const pair<string,string>& rhs) {return lhs.first < rhs.first; });
    //initialize vectors
    std::vector<pair<string,string>> v(p1.size() + p2.size());
    std::vector<pair<string,string>>::iterator it;
    //compute union
    it=std::set_union(p1.begin(), p1.end(),p2.begin(), p2.end(), v.begin());
    v.resize(it-v.begin());
    //print size
    //size = 4
    cout << v.size() << endl;
    return 0;
}

Answer 1

The union is done on the pair s, with the default operator< . ("A", "1") is different from ("A", "4") .

Give your comparator to std::set_union to achieve the expected result:

it=std::set_union(p1.begin(), p1.end(),p2.begin(), p2.end(), v.begin(),
    [](const pair<string,string>& lhs, const pair<string,string>& rhs) { return lhs.first < rhs.first; });

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Notice 1:

You should also name your lamda instead of typing it several times.

And I would use v.reserve and back_inserter(v) instead allocating the vector and using v.begin() to collect output:

 (...)
    //save comparator
    auto comp = [](const pair<string,string>& lhs, const pair<string,string>& rhs) {return lhs.first < rhs.first; };
    //sort vectors according to first element
    sort(p1.begin(), p1.end(), comp);
    sort(p2.begin(), p2.end(), comp);
    //initialize vectors
    std::vector<pair<string,string>> v;
    v.reserve(p1.size() + p2.size());
    //compute union
    std::set_union(p1.begin(), p1.end(), p2.begin(), p2.end(), back_inserter(v), comp);
    //print size
    //size == 4
    cout << v.size() << endl;
}

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Notice 2: what you do is similar to std::map