Finding the nth smallest number in a list?

Question

i need a efficient way of getting the nth smallest number AND its index in a list containing up to 15000 enties (so speed is not super crucial).

I sadly can\'t use n

Answer 1

Use enumerate to store the original position, then sort by the value:

original_list = [36, 44, 23, 24, 47, 19, 49, 36, 30, 3]
sorted_lookup = sorted(enumerate(original_list), key=lambda i:i[1])
position, value = sorted_lookup[4] # 4 is my "n"

sorted_lookup in my example is:

[(9, 3), (5, 19), (2, 23), (3, 24), (8, 30), (0, 36), (7, 36), (1, 44), (4, 47), (6, 49)]

And position is 8, value is 30