Detailed explanation of the deque double-ended queue structure in Python's collections module

Deque is the abbreviation of double-ended queue, similar to list, but provides insertion and deletion operations at both ends.

• appendleft inserts
on the left side of the list
• popleft pops the value on the left side of the list
• extendleft expands on the left

For example:

queue = deque()
# append values to wait for processing
queue.appendleft("first")
queue.appendleft("second")
queue.appendleft("third")
# pop values when ready
process(queue.pop()) # would process "first"
# add values while processing
queue.appendleft("fourth")
# what does the queue look like now?
queue # deque(['fourth', 'third', 'second'])

As a double-ended queue, deque also provides some other useful methods, such as rotate, etc. Let’s take a look at them below:

Padding
Deque can be filled from either end, which is called "left end" and "right end" in python.

import collections
d1 = collections.deque()
d1.extend('abcdefg')
print 'extend:', d1
d1.append('h')
print 'append:', d1
d2 = collections.deque()
d2.extendleft(xrange(6))
print 'extendleft', d2
d2.appendleft(6)
print 'appendleft', d2

extendleft() iteratively processes its input, completing the same processing as appendleft() for each element.

extend: deque(['a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e', 'f', 'g'])
append: deque(['a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e', 'f', 'g', 'h'])
extendleft deque([5, 4, 3, 2, 1, 0])
appendleft deque([6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, 0])

Use
Deque elements can be utilized from both ends, depending on the algorithm applied.

import collections
print "From the right:"
d = collections.deque('abcdefg')
while True:
 try:
  print d.pop(),
 except IndexError:
  break
print
print "\nFrom the left:"
d = collections.deque(xrange(6))
while True:
 try:
  print d.popleft(),
 except IndexError:
  break
print

Use pop() to delete an element from the right end of deque, and use popleft() to delete an element from the left end of deque.

From the right:
g f e d c b a

From the left:
0 1 2 3 4 5

Since deques are thread-safe, the contents of the queue can be utilized from both ends simultaneously in different threads.

import collections
import threading
import time
candle = collections.deque(xrange(5))
def burn(direction, nextSource):
 while True:
  try:
   next = nextSource()
  except IndexError:
   break
  else:
   print '%8s: %s' % (direction, next)
   time.sleep(0.1)
 print '%8s done' % direction
 return
left = threading.Thread(target=burn, args=('Left', candle.popleft))
right = threading.Thread(target=burn, args=('Right', candle.pop))
left.start()
right.start()
left.join()
right.join()

The thread processes both ends alternately, deleting elements until the deque is empty.

 Left: 0 Right: 4

 Right: 3 Left: 1

 Right: 2 Left done

 Right done

Rotate
Another function of deque is that it can rotate in any direction and skip some elements.

import collections
d = collections.deque(xrange(10))
print 'Normal:', d
d= collections.deque(xrange(10))
d.rotate(2)
print 'Right roration:', d
d = collections.deque(xrange(10))
d.rotate(-2)
print 'Left roration:', d

Result:

Normal: deque([0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9])
Right roration: deque([8, 9, 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7])
Left roration: deque([2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 0, 1])

Another example:

# -*- coding: utf-8 -*-
"""
下面这个是一个有趣的例子，主要使用了deque的rotate方法来实现了一个无限循环
的加载动画
"""
import sys
import time
from collections import deque
fancy_loading = deque('>--------------------')
while True:
 print '\r%s' % ''.join(fancy_loading),
 fancy_loading.rotate(1)
 sys.stdout.flush()
 time.sleep(0.08)

Output result:

# 一个无尽循环的跑马灯 
------------->-------