ordering shuffled points that can be joined to form a polygon (in python)

Question

I have a collection of points that join to form a polygon in 2D cartesian space. It is in the form of a python list of tuples

[(x1, y1), (x2, y2), ... , (xn,         


        

Answer 1

I wrote a paper on a generalization of your problem long ago. There is a nice desription here, created for a class in computational geometry. The generalization is that the algorithm works even if your polygon has holes; see below. If it does not have holes, it still works without modification.
     

J. O'Rourke, "Uniqueness of orthogonal connect-the-dots", Computational Morphology, G.T. Toussaint (editor), Elsevier Science Publishers, B.V.(North-Holland), 1988, 99-104.

Answer 2

This sorts your points according to polar coordinates:

import math
import matplotlib.patches as patches
import pylab
pp=[(-0.500000050000005, -0.5), (-0.499999950000005, 0.5), (-0.500000100000005, -1.0), (-0.49999990000000505, 1.0), (0.500000050000005, -0.5), (-1.0000000250000025, -0.5), (1.0000000250000025, -0.5), (0.499999950000005, 0.5), (-0.9999999750000024, 0.5), (0.9999999750000024, 0.5), (0.500000100000005, -1.0), (0.49999990000000505, 1.0), (-1.0, 0.0), (-0.0, -1.0), (0.0, 1.0), (1.0, 0.0), (-0.500000050000005, -0.5)]
# compute centroid
cent=(sum([p[0] for p in pp])/len(pp),sum([p[1] for p in pp])/len(pp))
# sort by polar angle
pp.sort(key=lambda p: math.atan2(p[1]-cent[1],p[0]-cent[0]))
# plot points
pylab.scatter([p[0] for p in pp],[p[1] for p in pp])
# plot polyline
pylab.gca().add_patch(patches.Polygon(pp,closed=False,fill=False))
pylab.grid()
pylab.show()