Compute the histogram entropy estimation of a string

Question

Write a program or function that estimates the Shannon entropy of a given string.

If a string has n characters, d distinct characters, x_i is the i th distinct character, and P(x_i) is the probability of that character occuring in the string, then our Shannon entropy estimate for that string is given by:

For the estimation in this challenge we assume that the probability of a character occurring in a string is simply the number of times it occurs divided by the total number of characters.

Your answer must be accurate to at least 3 digits after the period.

---

Test cases:

"This is a test.", 45.094
"00001111", 8.000
"cwmfjordbankglyphsvextquiz", 122.211
"             ", 0.0

Answer 1

Python 3.3+, 64 bytes

import math
lambda s:sum(math.log2(len(s)/s.count(c))for c in s)

Got math.log2 from mbomb007's solution.

Answer 2

Jelly, 11 8 bytes

ċЀ÷Ll.S

Try it online!

Answer 3

APL, 18 14 bytes

+/2⍟≢÷(+/∘.=⍨)

This is an unnamed, monadic function train that accepts a string on the right and returns a real.

Like all good things in life, this uses xnor's formula. We get a matrix of booleans corresponding to the occurrences of each character in the string using ∘.=⍨, sum this along the first axis (+/) to get the number of occurrences of each character, divide the length of the string by each, then take log base 2 (2⍟) and sum.

Try it here

Saved 4 bytes thanks to Dennis!

Answer 4

MATL, 17 bytes

S4#Y'ts/tZl*sGn_*

Try it online!

Answer 5

JavaScript (ES6), 67 bytes

s=>[...s].map(c=>t+=Math.log2(s.length/~-s.split(c).length),t=0)&&t

I need to use ~-s.split because that accepts strings rather than regexps. As usual, map beats reduce by a byte.

s=>[...s].reduce((t,c)=>t+Math.log2(s.length/~-s.split(c).length),0)

Answer 6

Perl 5, 58 bytes

A subroutine:

{for$a(@a=split'',pop){$t+=(log@a/grep/\Q$a/,@a)/log 2}$t}

A tip of my hat to xnor for the formula.

Answer 7

MATL, 14 bytes

!Gu=stGn/Zl*s|

Try it online!

!      % transpose implicit input into column vector
Gu     % row vector with unique elements of input
=      % test for equality, element-wise with broadcast
s      % sum of each column
tGn/   % duplicate. Divide by number of input characters
Zl     % binary logarithm
*      % element-wise multiplication
s      % sum of array
|      % absolute value. Display implicitly

Answer 8

Julia, 37 bytes

x->sum(log2(endof(x)./sum(x.==x',1)))

Takes a character array as input. Try it online!

Answer 9

J - 18 16 14 bytes

1#.2^.#%1#.=/~

Shortened using the idea in Dennis' method.

Usage

   f =: 1#.2^.#%1#.=/~
   f 'This is a test.'
45.0936
   f '00001111'
8
   f 'cwmfjordbankglyphsvextquiz'
122.211
   f '             '
0

Explanation

1#.2^.#%1#.=/~  Input: string S
           =/~  Create a table testing for equality
        1#.     Convert each row from a list of base 1 digits to decimal
                This is equivalent to taking the sum and forms a list of tallies
      #         Get the length of S
       %        Divide the length by each tally
   2^.          Log base 2 of each
1#.             "Sum" those values and return

Answer 10

Pyth - 17 bytes

*_lQsm*FlBc/QdlQ{

Try it online here.

Answer 11

Jolf, 26 bytes

_*liuΜGμiEd*γ/l miLeHlimzγ

Try it here! (Note that the test suite function is borked.)

Explanation

_*liuΜGμiEd*γ/l miLeHlimzγ
       μi                   unique members of i
      G  E                  split on ""
     Μ    d                 map over function
               _miLeH       match i with regex escaped member
             /l      li     divide length of (^) by length of i
            γ               γ = (^)
           *           mzγ  (^) * log_2(γ)
 *li                        (^) * length of i
_                           negate

Answer 12

Python 3.3+, 95 91 89 85 bytes

Simple solution. Version 3.3 is required to use math.log2.

import math
def f(s):C=s.count;return-sum(C(x)*math.log2(C(x)/len(s))for x in set(s))

Try it online

Answer 13

Java 7, 207 bytes

double C(String x,Map<Character,Integer>f){double H=0,g;for(char c:x.toCharArray())f.put(c,f.containsKey(c)?f.get(c)+1:1);for(char c:f.keySet()){g=f.get(c);H+=g*Math.log(g/x.length())/Math.log(2);}return-H;}

Detailed try online

double log2(double d) { return Math.log(d) / Math.log(2); }

double C(String x, Map<Character,Integer>f)
{
    double H=0,g;

    // frequency
    for(char c : x.toCharArray())
    {
        f.put(c, f.containsKey(c) ? f.get(c)+1 : 1);
    }

    // calculate entropy
    for(char c : f.keySet())
    {
        g = f.get(c);
        H += g * log2(g / x.length());
    }

    return -H;
}

Answer 14

Factor, 98 bytes

[ [ length ] [ dup [ [ = ] curry dupd count ] { } map-as nip ] bi [ / log 2 log / ] with map sum ]

This is a direct translation of this Python answer. I'll add an explanation over dinner.

Answer 15

Racket, 130 bytes

:c

#lang racket
(require math)(λ(S)(let([s(string->list S)])(sum(map(λ(c)(/(log(/(length s)(count(λ(x)(char=? c x))s)))(log 2)))s))))

Translation of my Factor answer, so it's an indirect translation of Kenny Lau's Python answer.

Answer 16

k (32 bytes)

{-+/c*(log c%n:+/c:#:'=x)%log 2}

Or in q, the translation is not all that short but clearer:

{neg sum c*2 xlog c%n:sum c:count each group x}

Answer 17

Mathematica, 45 bytes

Tr[Log[2,Tr@#/#]#]&@Values@CharacterCounts@#&

Usage

This returns exact results so we approximate them with N.

  f = Tr[Log[2,Tr@#/#]#]&@Values@CharacterCounts@#&
  f["This is a test."]//N
45.0936
  f["00001111"]//N
8.
  f["cwmfjordbankglyphsvextquiz"]//N
122.211
  f["             "]//N
0.

Answer 18

R, 67 bytes

l=length(i<-strsplit(readline(),"")[[1]]);-sum(log2(l/table(i)[i]))

Explanation

Take input from stdin and split it into a list of characters. (This clunky syntax is why string golf challenges are so tough in R...)

         i<-strsplit(readline(),"")[[1]])

This assignment is hidden inside of a length command, so we get two assignments for the price of one. We have i, the list of characters, and l, its length.

l=length(i<-strsplit(readline(),"")[[1]]);

Now we calculate the entropy. R has a nice function table which returns the counts of all unique values. For input This is a test, table(i) returns

> table(i)
i
  . a e h i s t T 
3 1 1 1 1 2 3 2 1

This is indexed by characters, which is nice, as we can then use i as an index to get the count of each character, like so:

> table(i)[i]
i
T h i s   i s   a   t e s t . 
1 1 2 3 3 2 3 3 1 3 2 1 3 2 1 

The rest of the code is then a simple implementation of the entropy formula, flipped around a little.

                                           -sum(log2(l/table(i)[i]))

Answer 19

C#, 159 bytes

Golfed:

string f(string s){var l=s.Length;double sum=0;foreach(var item in s.GroupBy(o=>o)){double p=(double)item.Count()/l;sum+=p*Math.Log(p,2);}return(sum*=-l)+"";}}

Ungolfed:

string f(string s)
{
  var l = s.Length;
  double sum = 0;
  foreach (var item in s.GroupBy(o => o))
  {
    double p = (double)item.Count() / l;
    sum += p * Math.Log(p, 2);
  }
  return (sum *= -l) + "";
}

Test:

var codeGolf = new StringHistogramEntropyEstimation();
    Console.WriteLine(codeGolf.f("This is a test.")); //45.0935839298008
    Console.WriteLine(codeGolf.f("00001111")); //8
    Console.WriteLine(codeGolf.f("cwmfjordbankglyphsvextquiz")); //122.211432671668
    Console.WriteLine(codeGolf.f("             ")); //0

Answer 20

Groovy, 100 Bytes

{a->n=a.size();a.toList().unique().collect{p=a.count(it)/n;p*(Math.log(p)/Math.log(2.0f))}.sum()*-n}

Tests:

This is a test. = 45.09358393449714
00001111 = 8.0
cwmfjordbankglyphsvextquiz = 122.21143275636976
aaaaaaaa = -0.0