# How to do Butterfly Shuffle in JavaScript?

JavascriptWeb DevelopmentObject Oriented Programming

A butterfly shuffled array in JavaScript is an array of Numbers that is sorted such that the numbers decrease as we approach the center of array and increase as we approach the end of array. The biggest number is placed at the very first index.

Another variation of butterfly shuffled array is where the numbers increase towards the center and decrease towards the end. In this case the smallest number is placed at the very first index.

For people who come from a Mathematics background, it’s somewhat relatable to the Guassian distribution.

Example

Suppose we have this array −

const arr = [8,2,6,3,9,1,4,5,0,7];

If we apply butterfly shuffling to it, the output will be −

[9, 7, 5, 3, 1,0, 2, 4, 6, 8]

See how the biggest and second biggest numbers are placed at extreme ends and the smallest number at center.

Another possibility can be −

[0, 2, 4, 6, 8, 9, 7, 5, 3, 1]

Our job is to write a function that takes in an array of Numbers and a string as the second argument, the string can take any of the two values ‘asc’ or ‘des’. −

• If string is ‘des’ then we have to shuffle the array in increasing to decreasing order.

• If it’s ‘asc’ then we have to shuffle the array in decreasing to increasing order.

## Approach

• If the string is ‘asc’ we initially sort the array in ascending order otherwise in descending order. So, consider the function was called with ‘asc’, then the array now would look like −

[0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9]
• We then split the array into two arrays such that adjacent elements are distributed in opposite arrays. We push elements in one array while we unshift them in the other, so that one array gets reversed without having us to do this manually.

The two arrays thus formed will look like −

[ 0, 2, 4, 6, 8 ] [ 9, 7, 5, 3, 1 ]
• Now the last step is to concatenate these arrays and after which we will get our required array. All this when put in code will look something like this −

## Example

const array = [8,2,6,3,9,1,4,5,0,7];
const butterflyShuffle = (array, order = 'asc') => {
//creating a new copy of array so that we dont mutate the original
array
const arr = array.slice();
//sorting ascending or descending based on the argument
arr.sort((a, b) => order === 'asc' ? a-b : b-a);
const first = [], second = [];
//this variable will later help in determining which array is to be
reversed
//and which one is to be concatenated to which
//if length is even, it means that last element will go in second array
//otherwise it will go in first array
const isEven = arr.length % 2 === 0;
for (let i = 0; i < arr.length; i++){
if(i % 2 === 0){
isEven ? first.push(arr[i]) : first.unshift(arr[i]);
continue;
};
isEven ? second.unshift(arr[i]) : second.push(arr[i]);
};
return isEven ? second.concat(first) : first.concat(second);
};
console.log(butterflyShuffle(array));
console.log(butterflyShuffle(array, 'des'));

## Output

The output in the console will be −

[
9, 7, 5, 3, 1,
0, 2, 4, 6, 8
]
[
0, 2, 4, 6, 8,
9, 7, 5, 3, 1
]
Published on 25-Aug-2020 06:20:28