Yes, this is exactly what the author is trying to port to Python. Mandatory reference link: http://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/algorithm/nth_element http://en.cp

Yes, this is exactly what the author is trying to port to Python. Mandatory reference link: http://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/algorithm/nth_element http://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/algorithm/nth_element . Note linear complexity. There's also std::partial_sort: http://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/algorithm/partial_sort http://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/algorithm/partial_sort