Python Program to Merge a Matrix By the Elements of First Column

Given a Matrix, perform merge on the basis of the element in the first column.

Input : test_list = [[4, “geeks”], [3, “Gfg”], [4, “CS”], [4, “cs”], [3, “best”]] 
Output : [[4, ‘geeks’, ‘CS’, ‘cs’], [3, ‘Gfg’, ‘best’]] 
Explanation : 4 is paired with geeks, CS and cs hence are merged into 1 row.

Input : test_list = [[4, “geeks”], [3, “Gfg”], [4, “CS”], [5, “cs”], [3, “best”]] 
Output : [[4, ‘geeks’, ‘CS’, ‘cs’], [3, ‘Gfg’, ‘best’], [5, ‘cs’]] 
Explanation : 4 is paired with geeks and CS hence are merged into 1 row. 

Method 1 : Using setdefault() and list comprehension

In this, the task of grouping is done using setdefault(), which assigns key as first column element and rest of elements as values of list. List comprehension is used post that to get all the values from dictionary constructed.

Python3

# initializing list
test_list = [[4, "geeks"], [3, "Gfg"], [4, "CS"],
             [4, "cs"], [3, "best"]]

# printing original list
print("The original list is : " + str(test_list))

res = {}
for key, val in test_list:

    # setdefault used to merge similar values
    res.setdefault(key, []).append(val)

# getting all values
res = [[key] + val for key, val in res.items()]

# printing result
print("Merged Matrix : " + str(res))

Output:

The original list is : [[4, ‘geeks’], [3, ‘Gfg’], [4, ‘CS’], [4, ‘cs’], [3, ‘best’]]
Merged Matrix : [[4, ‘geeks’, ‘CS’, ‘cs’], [3, ‘Gfg’, ‘best’]]

Method 2 : Using values() and setdefault()

Here, we extract the values using values(), rest all the operations are performed in a similar manner as explained above. This program omits from the list the first column element based on which grouping was performed.

Python3

# initializing list
test_list = [[4, "geeks"], [3, "Gfg"], [4, "CS"],
             [4, "cs"], [3, "best"]]

# printing original list
print("The original list is : " + str(test_list))

res = {}
for key, val in test_list:

    # setdefault used to merge similar values
    res.setdefault(key, []).append(val)

# fetch values using value()
res = list(res.values())

# printing result
print("Merged Matrix : " + str(res))

Output:

The original list is : [[4, ‘geeks’], [3, ‘Gfg’], [4, ‘CS’], [4, ‘cs’], [3, ‘best’]]
Merged Matrix : [[‘geeks’, ‘CS’, ‘cs’], [‘Gfg’, ‘best’]]