I have two dataframes like this:
import pandas as pd
import numpy as np
df1 = pd.DataFrame(
{
'A': list('aaabdcde'),
'B': list('smnipiuy'),
'C': list('zzzqqwll')
}
)
df2 = pd.DataFrame(
{
'mapcol': list('abpppozl')
}
)
A B C
0 a s z
1 a m z
2 a n z
3 b i q
4 d p q
5 c i w
6 d u l
7 e y l
mapcol
0 a
1 b
2 p
3 p
4 p
5 o
6 z
7 l
Now I want to create an additional column in df1 which should be filled with values coming from the columns A, B and C respectively, depending on whether their values can be found in df2['mapcol']. If the values in one row can be found in more than one column, they should be first used from A, then B and then C, so my expected outcome looks like this:
A B C final
0 a s z a # <- values can be found in A and C, but A is preferred
1 a m z a # <- values can be found in A and C, but A is preferred
2 a n z a # <- values can be found in A and C, but A is preferred
3 b i q b # <- value can be found in A
4 d p q p # <- value can be found in B
5 c i w NaN # none of the values can be mapped
6 d u l l # value can be found in C
7 e y l l # value can be found in C
A straightforward implementation could look like this (filling the column final iteratively using fillna in the preferred order):
preferred_order = ['A', 'B', 'C']
df1['final'] = np.nan
for col in preferred_order:
df1['final'] = df1['final'].fillna(df1[col][df1[col].isin(df2['mapcol'])])
which gives the desired outcome.
Does anyone see a solution that avoids the loop?