How to perform pairwise operation like `%in%` and set operations for a list of vectors

We could use outer(x, y, FUN). x and y need not be a "numeric" input like numerical vector / matrix; a vector input like "list" / "matrix list" is also allowed.

For example, to apply pairwise "%in%" operation, we use

z <- outer(lst, lst, FUN = Vectorize("%in%", SIMPLIFY = FALSE, USE.NAMES = FALSE))
#     vec1      vec2      vec3      vec4     
#vec1 Logical,2 Logical,2 Logical,2 Logical,2
#vec2 Logical,3 Logical,3 Logical,3 Logical,3
#vec3 Logical,4 Logical,4 Logical,4 Logical,4
#vec4 Logical,5 Logical,5 Logical,5 Logical,5

Since "%in%" itself is not vectorized, we use Vectorized("%in%"). We also need SIMPLIFY = FALSE, so that FUN returns a length-1 list for each pair (x[[i]], y[[j]]). This is important, as outer works like:

y[[4]] | FUN(x[[1]], y[[4]])  FUN(x[[2]], y[[4]])  FUN(x[[1]], y[[4]])  FUN(x[[2]], y[[4]])
y[[3]] | FUN(x[[1]], y[[3]])  FUN(x[[2]], y[[3]])  FUN(x[[1]], y[[3]])  FUN(x[[2]], y[[4]])
y[[2]] | FUN(x[[1]], y[[2]])  FUN(x[[2]], y[[2]])  FUN(x[[1]], y[[2]])  FUN(x[[2]], y[[4]])
y[[1]] | FUN(x[[1]], y[[1]])  FUN(x[[2]], y[[1]])  FUN(x[[1]], y[[1]])  FUN(x[[2]], y[[4]])
         -------------------  -------------------  -------------------  -------------------
         x[[1]]               x[[2]]               x[[3]]               x[[4]]

It must be satisfied that length(FUN(x, y)) == length(x) * length(y). While if SIMPLIFY = FALSE, this does not necessarily hold.

The result z above is a "matrix list", with class(z) being "matrix", but typeof(z) being "list". Read Why is this matrix not numeric? for more.

If we want to further apply some summary function to each element of z, we could use lapply. Here I would offer two examples.

Example 1: Apply any()

Since any(a %in% b) is as same as any(b %in% a), i.e., the operation is symmetric, we only need to work with the lower triangular of z:

lz <- z[lower.tri(z)]

lapply returns an unnamed list, but for readability we want a named list. We may use matrix index (i, j) as name:

ind <- which(lower.tri(z), arr.ind = TRUE)
NAME <- paste(ind[,1], ind[,2], sep = ":")
any_lz <- setNames(lapply(lz, any), NAME)

#List of 6
# $ 2:1: logi FALSE
# $ 3:1: logi TRUE
# $ 4:1: logi TRUE
# $ 3:2: logi TRUE
# $ 4:2: logi FALSE
# $ 4:3: logi TRUE

Set operations like intersect, union and setequal are also symmetric operations which we can work with similarly.

Example 2: Apply which()

which(a %in% b) is not a symmetric operation, so we have to work with the full matrix.

NAME <- paste(1:nrow(z), rep(1:nrow(z), each = ncol(z)), sep = ":")
which_z <- setNames(lapply(z, which), NAME)

# List of 16
#  $ 1:1: int [1:2] 1 2
#  $ 2:1: int(0) 
#  $ 3:1: int [1:2] 1 2
#  $ 4:1: int 3
#  $ 1:2: int(0) 
#  $ 2:2: int [1:3] 1 2 3
#  ...

Set operations like setdiff is also asymmetric and can be dealt with similarly.

Alternatives

Apart from using outer(), we could also use R expressions to obtain the z above. Again, I take binary operation "%in%" as an example:

op <- "'%in%'"    ## operator

lst_name <- names(lst)
op_call <- paste0(op, "(", lst_name, ", ", rep(lst_name, each = length(lst)), ")")
# [1] "'%in%'(vec1, vec1)" "'%in%'(vec2, vec1)" "'%in%'(vec3, vec1)"
# [4] "'%in%'(vec4, vec1)" "'%in%'(vec1, vec2)" "'%in%'(vec2, vec2)"
# ...

Then we can parse and evaluate these expressions within lst. We may use combination index for names of the resulting list:

NAME <- paste(1:length(lst), rep(1:length(lst), each = length(lst)), sep = ":")
z <- setNames(lapply(parse(text = op_call), eval, lst), NAME)

# List of 16
#  $ 1:1: logi [1:2] TRUE TRUE
#  $ 2:1: logi [1:3] FALSE FALSE FALSE
#  $ 3:1: logi [1:4] TRUE TRUE FALSE FALSE
#  $ 4:1: logi [1:5] FALSE FALSE TRUE FALSE FALSE
#  $ 1:2: logi [1:2] FALSE FALSE
#  ...