Find minimum value in list<> using STL

Question

I have list or vector of float numbers. How to find minimum value in list/vector using STL algorithm ? I can find with iteration, but is there more elegant way to do this ?

Answer 1

You can use std::min_element algorithm. Note that it won't be any faster than your iteration based algorithm, it is still O(n) complexity. But the amount of code written will be less.

Answer 2

std::vector<float>::iterator iter = std::min_element(items.begin(), items.end());

std::cout << *iter << "\n";