Replace list of list with “condensed” list of list while maintaining order

Question

I have a list of list as in the code I attached. I want to link each sub list if there are any common values. I then want to replace the list of list with a condensed list

Answer 1

This solution uses only an Ordered Dictionary.
deepcopy() is necessary if one wants the original copy to remain unchanged.

from collections import OrderedDict
from copy import deepcopy

def treat(passed_list):
    L = deepcopy(passed_list)

    dic = OrderedDict()
    for subl in L:
        for x in subl:
            if x not in dic:
                dic[x] =  subl
    print 'dic at start'
    print '\n'.join('%-3s : %s' % (a,dic[a])
                    for a in dic) + '\n'

    for sublist in L:
        short = []
        short.extend(el for el in sublist
                     if el not in short)
        seen  = []
        for k,val in dic.iteritems():
            if val is sublist:
                break
            if k in short:
                if val not in seen:
                    seen.append(val)

        sumseen = []
        for elseen in seen:
            for y in elseen:
                sumseen.append(y)
                dic[y] = sumseen

        if seen:
            for el in sublist:
                if el not in sumseen:
                    sumseen.append(el)
                    dic[el] = sumseen

        sublist[:] = short

    cumul = []
    cumul.extend(lu for lu in dic.itervalues()
                 if lu not in cumul)
    return cumul


plus = [[1,2,3,2,1],[10,5,5,5,10],
        [8,5,3,3,5],[45,50,12,45,40,12]]

lst = [[1,2,3], [10,5], [3,8,5]]

for one_list in (plus,lst):
    print 'one_list before == %r\n' % one_list
    print 'treat(one_list) == %r\n' % treat(one_list)
    print 'one_list after  == %r\n' % one_list
    print '===================================='

result

one_list before == [[1, 2, 3, 2, 1], [10, 5, 5, 5, 10], [8, 5, 3, 3, 5], [45, 50, 12, 45, 40, 12]]

dic at start
1   : [1, 2, 3, 2, 1]
2   : [1, 2, 3, 2, 1]
3   : [1, 2, 3, 2, 1]
10  : [10, 5, 5, 5, 10]
5   : [10, 5, 5, 5, 10]
8   : [8, 5, 3, 3, 5]
45  : [45, 50, 12, 45, 40, 12]
50  : [45, 50, 12, 45, 40, 12]
12  : [45, 50, 12, 45, 40, 12]
40  : [45, 50, 12, 45, 40, 12]

treat(one_list) == [[1, 2, 3, 10, 5, 8], [45, 50, 12, 40]]

one_list after  == [[1, 2, 3, 2, 1], [10, 5, 5, 5, 10], [8, 5, 3, 3, 5], [45, 50, 12, 45, 40, 12]]

====================================
one_list before == [[1, 2, 3], [10, 5], [3, 8, 5]]

dic at start
1   : [1, 2, 3]
2   : [1, 2, 3]
3   : [1, 2, 3]
10  : [10, 5]
5   : [10, 5]
8   : [3, 8, 5]

treat(one_list) == [[1, 2, 3, 10, 5, 8]]

one_list after  == [[1, 2, 3], [10, 5], [3, 8, 5]]

====================================

This solution has an inconvenience: it is 2 to 3 times slower than the J.F. Sebastian's solution.