How to match multiple columns in pandas DataFrame for an “interval”?

Question

I have the following pandas DataFrame:

import pandas as pd
df = pd.DataFrame(\'filename.csv\')
print(df)

order    start    end    value    
1        1342            


        

Answer 1

You can use merge with boolean indexing, but if DataFrames are large, scaling is problematic:

df1 = pd.merge(df, key_df, on='order', how='outer', suffixes=('','_key'))
df1 = df1[(df1.start <= df1.start_key) & (df1.end <= df1.end_key)]
print (df1)
    order  start   end      value  start_key  end_key   value_key
3       1   1342  1357  category1     1345.0   1392.0  category29
4       1   1342  1357  category1     1371.0   1383.0  category31
5       1   1342  1357  category1     1471.0   1501.0  category31
11      1   1459  1489  category7     1471.0   1501.0  category31

EDIT by comment:

df1 = pd.merge(df, key_df, on='order', how='outer', suffixes=('','_key'))
df1 = df1[(df1.start <= df1.start_key) & (df1.end <= df1.end_key)]
df1 = pd.merge(df, df1, on=['order','start','end', 'value'], how='left')
print (df1)
   order  start   end       value  start_key  end_key   value_key
0      1   1342  1357   category1     1345.0   1392.0  category29
1      1   1342  1357   category1     1371.0   1383.0  category31
2      1   1342  1357   category1     1471.0   1501.0  category31
3      1   1459  1489   category7     1471.0   1501.0  category31
4      1   1572  1601  category23        NaN      NaN         NaN
5      1   1587  1599   category2        NaN      NaN         NaN
6      1   1591  1639   category1        NaN      NaN         NaN
7     15    792   813  category13        NaN      NaN         NaN
8     15    892   913   category5        NaN      NaN         NaN