selection based on percentage weighting

Question

I have a set of values, and an associated percentage for each:

a: 70% chance
b: 20% chance
c: 10% chance

I want to select a value (a, b, c) based

Answer 1

import random

def selector(weights):
    i=random.random()*sum(x for x,y in weights)
    for w,v in weights:
        if w>=i:
            break
        i-=w
    return v

weights = ((70,'a'),(20,'b'),(10,'c'))
print [selector(weights) for x in range(10)] 

it works equally well for fractional weights

weights = ((0.7,'a'),(0.2,'b'),(0.1,'c'))
print [selector(weights) for x in range(10)] 

If you have a lot of weights, you can use bisect to reduce the number of iterations required

import random
import bisect

def make_acc_weights(weights):
    acc=0
    acc_weights = []
    for w,v in weights:
        acc+=w
        acc_weights.append((acc,v))
    return acc_weights

def selector(acc_weights):
    i=random.random()*sum(x for x,y in weights)
    return weights[bisect.bisect(acc_weights, (i,))][1]

weights = ((70,'a'),(20,'b'),(10,'c'))
acc_weights = make_acc_weights(weights)    
print [selector(acc_weights) for x in range(100)]

Also works fine for fractional weights

weights = ((0.7,'a'),(0.2,'b'),(0.1,'c'))
acc_weights = make_acc_weights(weights)    
print [selector(acc_weights) for x in range(100)]