Select first n nonzero elements in each row of matrix

Hello

How to select first n nonzero elements from each row?

If I have matrix A, and I want result like B (three nonzero elements from each row):

Rusult also can be cell..

A=[1 3 0 2 5
    0 2 0 1 0
    2 0 0 0 0
    3 1 1 0 0];
B=[1 3 2
    2 1 0
    2 0 0
    3 1 1];

Answer 1

[Stephen23]

Linear indexing does this simply and efficiently. The trick is to work down the columns, which requires transposing:

>> A = [1,3,0,2,5;0,2,0,1,0;2,0,0,0,0;3,1,1,0,0]
A =
   1   3   0   2   5
   0   2   0   1   0
   2   0   0   0   0
   3   1   1   0   0
>> N = 3;
>> Z = A.';
>> S = size(Z);
>> [~,R] = sort(Z==0,1);
>> [~,C] = ndgrid(1:N,1:S(2));
>> X = sub2ind(S,R(1:N,:),C);
>> B = Z(X).'
B =
   1   3   2
   2   1   0
   2   0   0
   3   1   1

Probably the most efficient approach would be to use a simple loop, e.g. (not particularly optimized):

R = size(A,1);
B = zeros(R,N);
for k = 1:R
    tmp = nonzeros(A(k,:));
    idx = 1:min(N,numel(tmp));
    B(k,idx) = tmp(idx);
end

Some timings (1e3 iterations):

Elapsed time is 5.358 seconds. % madhan ravi's with loop and CELLFUN
Elapsed time is 0.606 seconds. % my answer with SUB2IND
Elapsed time is 0.265 seconds. % my answer with loop and indexing

[giometar]

Thank you very much for help.

Answer 2

[madhan ravi]

ix = cumprod(A ~= 0, 2); 
B = A(:, max(ix) ~= 0)

%OR
ix = cumprod(A ~= 0, 2); % remove cumprod(...) if you don't expect n consecutive nonzero elements
n = 3;
idx = find(cumsum(ix,2) == n, 1);
[~, c] = ind2sub(size(A), idx);
B = A(:, 1:c)

% OR
% if you don't want to specify n by yourself
ix = cumprod(A ~= 0, 2); % remove cumprod(...) if you don't expect n consecutive nonzero elements
ix1 = cumsum(ix,2); 
idx = find(ix1 == max(max(ix1)), 1); % use max(..., [], 'all') for later versions
[~, c] = ind2sub(size(A), idx);
B = A(:, 1:c)

[giometar]

Thanks for answer, but solution is not as expected. With your code I get B as:

B =

     1     3     0
     0     2     0
     2     0     0
     3     1     1

But B must be

     B=[1 3 2
    2 1 0
    2 0 0
    3 1 1];

[madhan ravi]

 n = 3; % n non-zero elements
 B = cell(size(A,1),1);
 for k = 1:size(A,1)
     B{k} =     nonzeros(A(k,:)).';
 end

 B = cellfun(@(x) x(1:numel(x) < n+1), B, 'un', 0);
 B = cell2mat(cellfun(@(x) [x, zeros(1, n-numel(x))], B, 'un',0))

[giometar]

Thanks madhan ravi for help. Your solution is also warking but solution from

Stephen Cobeldick is better for me