xref: /freebsd/lib/libc/stdlib/radixsort.3 (revision 63a938566d524836885917d95bd491aa4400b181)
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28.\"     @(#)radixsort.3	8.2 (Berkeley) 1/27/94
29.\" $FreeBSD$
30.\"
31.Dd January 27, 1994
32.Dt RADIXSORT 3
33.Os
34.Sh NAME
35.Nm radixsort , sradixsort
36.Nd radix sort
37.Sh LIBRARY
38.Lb libc
39.Sh SYNOPSIS
40.In limits.h
41.In stdlib.h
42.Ft int
43.Fn radixsort "const unsigned char **base" "int nmemb" "const unsigned char *table" "unsigned endbyte"
44.Ft int
45.Fn sradixsort "const unsigned char **base" "int nmemb" "const unsigned char *table" "unsigned endbyte"
46.Sh DESCRIPTION
47The
48.Fn radixsort
49and
50.Fn sradixsort
51functions
52are implementations of radix sort.
53.Pp
54These functions sort an array of pointers to byte strings, the initial
55member of which is referenced by
56.Fa base .
57The byte strings may contain any values; the end of each string
58is denoted by the user-specified value
59.Fa endbyte .
60.Pp
61Applications may specify a sort order by providing the
62.Fa table
63argument.
64If
65.Pf non- Dv NULL ,
66.Fa table
67must reference an array of
68.Dv UCHAR_MAX
69+ 1 bytes which contains the sort
70weight of each possible byte value.
71The end-of-string byte must have a sort weight of 0 or 255
72(for sorting in reverse order).
73More than one byte may have the same sort weight.
74The
75.Fa table
76argument
77is useful for applications which wish to sort different characters
78equally, for example, providing a table with the same weights
79for A-Z as for a-z will result in a case-insensitive sort.
80If
81.Fa table
82is NULL, the contents of the array are sorted in ascending order
83according to the
84.Tn ASCII
85order of the byte strings they reference and
86.Fa endbyte
87has a sorting weight of 0.
88.Pp
89The
90.Fn sradixsort
91function is stable, that is, if two elements compare as equal, their
92order in the sorted array is unchanged.
93The
94.Fn sradixsort
95function uses additional memory sufficient to hold
96.Fa nmemb
97pointers.
98.Pp
99The
100.Fn radixsort
101function is not stable, but uses no additional memory.
102.Pp
103These functions are variants of most-significant-byte radix sorting; in
104particular, see
105.An "D.E. Knuth" Ns 's
106.%T "Algorithm R"
107and section 5.2.5, exercise 10.
108They take linear time relative to the number of bytes in the strings.
109.Sh RETURN VALUES
110.Rv -std radixsort
111.Sh ERRORS
112.Bl -tag -width Er
113.It Bq Er EINVAL
114The value of the
115.Fa endbyte
116element of
117.Fa table
118is not 0 or 255.
119.El
120.Pp
121Additionally, the
122.Fn sradixsort
123function
124may fail and set
125.Va errno
126for any of the errors specified for the library routine
127.Xr malloc 3 .
128.Sh SEE ALSO
129.Xr sort 1 ,
130.Xr qsort 3
131.Pp
132.Rs
133.%A Knuth, D.E.
134.%D 1968
135.%B "The Art of Computer Programming"
136.%T "Sorting and Searching"
137.%V Vol. 3
138.%P pp. 170-178
139.Re
140.Rs
141.%A Paige, R.
142.%D 1987
143.%T "Three Partition Refinement Algorithms"
144.%J "SIAM J. Comput."
145.%V Vol. 16
146.%N No. 6
147.Re
148.Rs
149.%A McIlroy, P.
150.%D 1993
151.%B "Engineering Radix Sort"
152.%T "Computing Systems"
153.%V Vol. 6:1
154.%P pp. 5-27
155.Re
156.Sh HISTORY
157The
158.Fn radixsort
159function first appeared in
160.Bx 4.4 .
161