Python – Sort Matrix by total characters

When it is required to sort matrix by total characters, a method is defined that uses list comprehension and the 'sum' and 'len' methods to determine the result. This technique allows you to sort rows based on the combined length of all strings in each row.

Example

The following example demonstrates sorting a matrix by total characters ?

def total_characters(row):
    return sum([len(element) for element in row])

my_list = [["pyt", "is", "fun"], ["python", "fun"],["py", "4", "good"], ["python"]]

print("The list is :")
print(my_list)

my_list.sort(key=total_characters)

print("The result is :")
print(my_list)

The list is :
[['pyt', 'is', 'fun'], ['python', 'fun'], ['py', '4', 'good'], ['python']]
The result is :
[['python'], ['py', '4', 'good'], ['pyt', 'is', 'fun'], ['python', 'fun']]

How It Works

The sorting process follows these steps:

• The total_characters function calculates the total character count for each row by summing the lengths of all elements
• List comprehension iterates through each element in the row and applies len() to get character counts
• The sort() method uses the function as a key to determine sorting order
• Rows are arranged in ascending order based on their total character count

Alternative Using Lambda

You can achieve the same result using a lambda function ?

my_list = [["pyt", "is", "fun"], ["python", "fun"], ["py", "4", "good"], ["python"]]

print("Original list:")
print(my_list)

my_list.sort(key=lambda row: sum(len(element) for element in row))

print("Sorted by total characters:")
print(my_list)

Original list:
[['pyt', 'is', 'fun'], ['python', 'fun'], ['py', '4', 'good'], ['python']]
Sorted by total characters:
[['python'], ['py', '4', 'good'], ['pyt', 'is', 'fun'], ['python', 'fun']]

Conclusion

Sorting matrices by total characters is accomplished using a custom key function that calculates the sum of string lengths in each row. This approach provides flexible sorting based on character count rather than alphabetical order.