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Brute Force Algorithms

Searching for smallest or largest value using linear search

Linear search can be used to search for the smallest or

largest value in an unsorted list rather than searching for
a match. It can do so by keeping track of the largest (or
smallest) value and updating as necessary as the
algorithm iterates through the dataset.

Create a variable called max_value_ind

Set max_value_index to the index of th
For each element in the search list
if element is greater than the ele
Set max_value_index equal to the
return max_value_index

Linear Search best case

For a list that contains n items, the best case for a linear
search is when the target value is equal to the first
element of the list. In such cases, only one comparison is
needed. Therefore, the best case performance is O(1).

Linear Search Complexity

Linear search runs in linear time and makes a maximum of

n comparisons, where n is the length of the list. Hence,
the computational complexity for linear search is O(N).
The running time increases, at most, linearly with the size
of the items present in the list.

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Linear Search expressed as a Function

A linear search can be expressed as a function that

compares each item of the passed dataset with the target
value until a match is found.
The given pseudocode block demonstrates a function
that performs a linear search. The relevant index is
returned if the target is found and -1 with a message that
a value is not found if it is not.

For each element in the array

if element equal target value then
return its index
if element is not found, return
“Value Not Found” message

Return value of a linear search

A function that performs a linear search can return a

message of success and the index of the matched value if
the search can successfully match the target with an
element of the dataset. In the event of a failure, a
message as well as -1 is returned as well.

For each element in the array

if element equal target value then
print success message
return its index
if element is not found
print Value not found message
return -1

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Modification of linear search function

A linear search can be modified so that all instances in

which the target is found are returned. This change can
be made by not ‘breaking’ when a match is found.

For each element in the searchList

if element equal target value then
Add its index to a list of occurre
if the list of occurrences is empty
raise ValueError
otherwise
return the list occurrences

Linear search

Linear search sequentially checks each element of a

given list for the target value until a match is found. If no
match is found, a linear search would perform the search
on all of the items in the list.
For instance, if there are n number of items in a list, and
the target value resides in the n-5 th position, a linear
search will check n-5 items total.

Linear search as a part of complex searching problems

Despite being a very simple search algorithm, linear

search can be used as a subroutine for many complex
searching problems. Hence, it is convenient to implement
linear search as a function so that it can be reused.

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Throwing Exception in Linear Search

The linear search function may throw a ValueError with def linear_search(lst, match):
a message when the target value is not found in the
for idx in range(len(lst)):
search list. Calling the linear search function inside a try
block is recommended to catch the ValueError if lst[idx] == match:
exception in the except block. return idx
else:
raise ValueError("{0} not in
list".format(match))

recipe = ["nori", "tuna", "soy sauce",

"sushi rice"]
ingredient = "avocado"
try:
print(linear_search(recipe, ingredient))
except ValueError as msg:
print("{0}".format(msg))

Find Maximum Value in Linear Search

The Linear Search function can be enhanced to find and def find_maximum(lst):
return the maximum value in a list of numeric elements.
max = None
This is done by maintaining a variable that is compared to
every element and updated when its value is smaller than for el in lst:
the current element. if max == None or el > max:
max = el
return max
test_scores = [88, 93, 75, 100, 80, 67,
71, 92, 90, 83]
print(find_maximum(test_scores)) # returns
100

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Linear Search Multiple Matches

A linear search function may have more than one match def linear_search(lst, match):
from the input list. Instead of returning just one index to
matches = []
the matched element, we return a list of indices. Every
time we encounter a match, we add the index to the list. for idx in range(len(lst)):
if lst[idx] == match:
matches.append(idx)
if matches:
return matches
else:
raise ValueError("{0} not in
list".format(match))

scores = [55, 65, 32, 40, 55]

print(linear_search(scores, 55))

Raise Error in Linear Search

A Linear Search function accepts two parameters: def linear_search(lst, match):

1) input list to search from
for idx in range(len(lst)):
2) target element to search for in the input l
if lst[idx] == match:
return idx
If the target element is found in the list, the function raise ValueError('Sorry, {0} is not
returns the element index. If it is not found, the function
raises an error. When implementing in Python, use the
found.'.format(match))
raise keyword with ValueError() .

Brute Force Algorithms

A brute force algorithm solves a problem through # pseudocode that prints all divisors of n
exhaustion: it goes through all possible choices
by brute force
until a solution is found.
The time complexity of a brute force algorithm is
often proportional to the input size. define printDivisors, n
Brute force algorithms are simple and consistent,
for all numbers from 1 to n
but very slow.
if the number is a divisor of n
print the number

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Linear Search Best and Worst Cases

The best-case performance for the Linear Search

algorithm is when the search item appears at the
beginning of the list and is O(1). The worst-case
performance is when the search item appears at the end
of the list or not at all. This would require N comparisons,
hence, the worse case is O(N).

Linear Search Average Runtime

The Linear Search Algorithm performance runtime varies

according to the item being searched. On average, this
algorithm has a Big-O runtime of O(N), even though the
average number of comparisons for a search that runs
only halfway through the list is N/2.

Linear Search Runtime

The Linear Search algorithm has a Big-O (worst case)

runtime of O(N). This means that as the input size
increases, the speed of the performance decreases
linearly. This makes the algorithm not efficient to use for
large data inputs.

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