Mix'n'matching

Have you ever did mental math to figure out how to best fit a collection of data into a set of DVDs, trying to squeeze the most into every single DVD? It happens more and more to me, so I wrote a Python script to do it for me.

The algorithm used to efficiently find the largest path combinations below a threshold is inspired in the apriori algorithm for association rule discovery. Since the largest path combination is a superset of smaller combinations, we can start building those starting from single paths, combine those with the initial to make two-item sets while removing all larger than the threshold, then three-item, four-item, and so on; until no larger combination below the threshold can be found.

Here is the script:

#!/usr/bin/env python
# mixnmatch.py - find combination of files/dirs that sum below a given threshold
# -- Jose Fonseca

import os
import os.path
import optparse
import sys

from sets import ImmutableSet as set


def get_size(path):
    if os.path.isdir(path):
        result = 0
        for name in os.listdir(path):
            result += get_size(os.path.join(path, name))
        return result
    else:
        return os.path.getsize(path)


def mix_and_match(limit, items, verbose = False):

    # filter items
    items = [(size, name) for size, name in items if size <= limit]
    # sort them by size
    items.sort(lambda (xsize, xname), (ysize, yname): cmp(xsize, ysize))

    # initialize variables
    added_collections = dict([(set([name]), size) for size, name in items])
    collections = added_collections

    while True:
        if verbose:
            sys.stderr.write("%d\n" % len(collections))

        # find unique combinations of the recent collections 
        new_collections = {}
        for names1, size1 in added_collections.iteritems():
            for size2, name2 in items:
                size3 = size1 + size2
                if size3 > limit:
                    # we can break here as all collections that follow are
                    #  bigger in size due to the sorting above
                    break
                if name2 in names1:
                    continue
                names3 = names1.union(set([name2]))
                if names3 in new_collections:
                    continue
                new_collections[names3] = size3

        if len(new_collections) == 0:
            break

        collections.update(new_collections)
        added_collections = new_collections

    return [(size, names) for names, size in collections.iteritems()]


def main():
    parser = optparse.OptionParser(usage="\n\t%prog [options] path ...")
    parser.add_option(
        '-l', '--limit',
        type="int", dest="limit", default=4700000000,
        help="total size limit")
    parser.add_option(
        '-s', '--show',
        type="int", dest="show", default=10,
        help="number of combinations to show")
    parser.add_option(
        '-v', '--verbose',
        action="store_true", dest="verbose", default=False,
        help="verbose output")
    (options, args) = parser.parse_args(sys.argv[1:])

    limit = options.limit

    items = [(get_size(arg), arg) for arg in args]

    collections = mix_and_match(limit, items, options.verbose)
    collections.sort(lambda (xsize, xnames), (ysize, ynames): -cmp(xsize, ysize))
    if options.show != 0:
        collections = collections[0:options.show]

    for size, names in collections:
        percentage = 100.0*float(size)/float(limit)
        try:
            sys.stdout.write("%10d\t%02.2f%%\t%s\n" % (size, percentage, " ".join(names)))
        except IOError:
            # ignore broken pipe
            pass


if __name__ == '__main__':
    main()

This script has also been posted as a Python Cookbook Recipe.