How in Scala to find unique items in List

How in Scala to find unique items in List?

In 2.8, it's:

List(1,2,3,2,1).distinct  // => List(1, 2, 3)

The most efficient order-preserving way of doing this would be to use a Set as an ancillary data structure:

def unique[A](ls: List[A]) = {
  def loop(set: Set[A], ls: List[A]): List[A] = ls match {
    case hd :: tail if set contains hd => loop(set, tail)
    case hd :: tail => hd :: loop(set + hd, tail)
    case Nil => Nil
  }

  loop(Set(), ls)
}

We can wrap this in some nicer syntax using an implicit conversion:

implicit def listToSyntax[A](ls: List[A]) = new {
  def unique = unique(ls)
}

List(1, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 4).unique    // => List(1, 2, 3, 4, 5)

Roll your own uniq filter with order retention:

scala> val l = List(1,2,3,3,4,6,5,6)
l: List[Int] = List(1, 2, 3, 3, 4, 6, 5, 6)

scala> l.foldLeft(Nil: List[Int]) {(acc, next) => if (acc contains next) acc else next :: acc }.reverse
res0: List[Int] = List(1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 5)

How in Scala to find unique items in List

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