Select
Select [data,critprop]
returns the property prop of the selected elements.
Details
- Select keeps the elements for which the given criterion crit is True .
- The data can have the following additional forms and interpretations:
- The property prop can have the following forms and interpretations:
-
"Element" the selected values »"Index" indices of the selected values »"BitVectorMask" Boolean mask returning True for slected values and False otherwise »
- Select [crit][data] is equivalent to Select [data,crit].
- Parallelize [Select[data,crit]] or ParallelSelect [data,crit] computes Select [data,crit] in parallel on all subkernels. »
Examples
open allclose allBasic Examples (6)
Select elements that are even:
Return the indices of the selected elements:
Return only the first expression selected:
Use the operator form of Select :
Select operates on values in an Association :
Select rows in a Tabular object:
Scope (15)
Basic Uses (5)
Find pairs containing x:
Find up to 2 pairs containing x:
Fewer than the requested elements may be returned:
Use a pure function to test each element:
Use an operator form as selection criterion:
Use Select in operator form:
Input Data (5)
Select works with any head, not just List :
Select works on values in Association :
Select works with SparseArray objects:
The result may be a list if it is not sparse:
Select works with TabularColumn objects:
Select all dates in November:
The distribution of the dates is uniform:
Use Select on a Tabular object with named columns:
Select rows with last column date being a business day:
Property Forms (5)
Return the selected elements:
Return the indices of the selected elements:
Return the Boolean mask of the data:
Return two forms:
Return the association with all the properties:
Applications (7)
Select numbers up to 100 that equal 1 modulo both 3 and 5:
Select 4-tuples that read the same in reverse:
Find the first four 3×3 matrices of 0s and 1s that have determinant 1:
Select eigenvalues that lie within the unit circle:
Find built-in Wolfram Language objects whose names are less than 3 characters long:
Select numeric quantities from a product:
Find an approximation to by finding the proportion of points that lie within a disk:
Properties & Relations (4)
Select is complementary to Discard :
Select is similar to Cases except that it uses a function instead of a pattern:
Select the lists that have sum of elements less than 10:
Use Cases to get the same result:
Select elements that are even:
Use GatherBy to separate odd and even elements:
Use GroupBy to construct an association explicitly containing as keys the results of the criterion:
Compute Select in parallel:
See Also
SelectFirst Discard Cases Take Drop Reap Pick GatherBy GroupBy MatchQ StringMatchQ FreeQ ParallelSelect
Function Repository: SelectPositions SelectIndices Discard IncrementalParallelSelect
Tech Notes
Related Guides
-
▪
- Elements of Lists ▪
- Computation with Structured Datasets ▪
- Functional Programming ▪
- Function Composition & Operator Forms ▪
- Database-Like Operations on Datasets ▪
- List Manipulation ▪
- Tabular Objects ▪
- Handling Arrays of Data ▪
- Associations ▪
- Conditionals ▪
- Language Overview ▪
- Numerical Data ▪
- Tabular Transformation
Related Links
- Fast Introduction for Programmers: Functionals & Operators
- An Elementary Introduction to the Wolfram Language : Tests and Conditionals
- An Elementary Introduction to the Wolfram Language : Expressions and Their Structure
- An Elementary Introduction to the Wolfram Language : Natural Language Understanding
- An Elementary Introduction to the Wolfram Language : Creating Websites and Apps
- An Elementary Introduction to the Wolfram Language : Datasets
- NKS|Online (A New Kind of Science)
History
Introduced in 1988 (1.0) | Updated in 2003 (5.0) ▪ 2014 (10.0) ▪ 2025 (14.2)
Text
Wolfram Research (1988), Select, Wolfram Language function, https://reference.wolfram.com/language/ref/Select.html (updated 2025).
CMS
Wolfram Language. 1988. "Select." Wolfram Language & System Documentation Center. Wolfram Research. Last Modified 2025. https://reference.wolfram.com/language/ref/Select.html.
APA
Wolfram Language. (1988). Select. Wolfram Language & System Documentation Center. Retrieved from https://reference.wolfram.com/language/ref/Select.html
BibTeX
@misc{reference.wolfram_2025_select, author="Wolfram Research", title="{Select}", year="2025", howpublished="\url{https://reference.wolfram.com/language/ref/Select.html}", note=[Accessed: 10-April-2025 ]}
BibLaTeX
@online{reference.wolfram_2025_select, organization={Wolfram Research}, title={Select}, year={2025}, url={https://reference.wolfram.com/language/ref/Select.html}, note=[Accessed: 10-April-2025 ]}