What is the fastest search you can do on an unsorted array?

Question

How to quickly search in an unordered array? I can’t think of any other search mechanisms than linear search.

Any pointers would be helpful.

Answer 1

Yes, without sorting the data, a linear search is about as good as you can.

Answer 2

Given a truly random, not sorted array, a linear search is the best way.

You may be able to improve some heuristic approach if the data can be considered roughly sorted.

Answer 3

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Answer 8

If you are able, you might consider changing the way you store and create data in the first place. Instead of adding elements to the array, create a complete binary tree (or something else) and work with it. This makes data manipulation a little slower, but it should not be as slow as re-sorting the data every time and will make your searches much faster.