I know this is a very old question, but I think there s a neat trick to do this in O(n) time if you apply a little math!

The exponential distribution has two very useful properties.

1. Given n samples from different exponential distributions with different rate parameters, the probability that a given sample is the minimum is equal to its rate parameter divided by the sum of all rate parameters.

2. It is "memoryless". So if you already know the minimum, then the probability that any of the remaining elements is the 2nd-to-min is the same as the probability that if the true min were removed (and never generated), that element would have been the new min. This seems obvious, but I think because of some conditional probability issues, it might not be true of other distributions.

Using fact 1, we know that choosing a single element can be done by generating these exponential distribution samples with rate parameter equal to the weight, and then choosing the one with minimum value.

Using fact 2, we know that we don t have to re-generate the exponential samples. Instead, just generate one for each element, and take the k elements with lowest samples.

Finding the lowest k can be done in O(n). Use the Quickselect algorithm to find the k-th element, then simply take another pass through all elements and output all lower than the k-th.

A useful note: if you don t have immediate access to a library to generate exponential distribution samples, it can be easily done by: -ln(rand())/weight

If the sampling is with replacement, you can use this algorithm (implemented here in Python):

import random

items = [(10, "low"),
         (100, "mid"),
         (890, "large")]

def weighted_sample(items, n):
    total = float(sum(w for w, v in items))
    i = 0
    w, v = items[0]
    while n:
        x = total * (1 - random.random() ** (1.0 / n))
        total -= x
        while x > w:
            x -= w
            i += 1
            w, v = items[i]
        w -= x
        yield v
        n -= 1

This is O(n + m) where m is the number of items.

Why does this work? It is based on the following algorithm:

def n_random_numbers_decreasing(v, n):
    """Like reversed(sorted(v * random() for i in range(n))),
    but faster because we avoid sorting."""
    while n:
        v *= random.random() ** (1.0 / n)
        yield v
        n -= 1

The function weighted_sample is just this algorithm fused with a walk of the items list to pick out the items selected by those random numbers.

This in turn works because the probability that n random numbers 0..v will all happen to be less than z is P = (z/v)ⁿ. Solve for z, and you get z = vP^1/n. Substituting a random number for P picks the largest number with the correct distribution; and we can just repeat the process to select all the other numbers.

If the sampling is without replacement, you can put all the items into a binary heap, where each node caches the total of the weights of all items in that subheap. Building the heap is O(m). Selecting a random item from the heap, respecting the weights, is O(log m). Removing that item and updating the cached totals is also O(log m). So you can pick n items in O(m + n log m) time.

(Note: "weight" here means that every time an element is selected, the remaining possibilities are chosen with probability proportional to their weights. It does not mean that elements appear in the output with a likelihood proportional to their weights.)

Here s an implementation of that, plentifully commented:

import random

class Node:
    # Each node in the heap has a weight, value, and total weight.
    # The total weight, self.tw, is self.w plus the weight of any children.
    __slots__ = [ w ,  v ,  tw ]
    def __init__(self, w, v, tw):
        self.w, self.v, self.tw = w, v, tw

def rws_heap(items):
    # h is the heap. It s like a binary tree that lives in an array.
    # It has a Node for each pair in `items`. h[1] is the root. Each
    # other Node h[i] has a parent at h[i>>1]. Each node has up to 2
    # children, h[i<<1] and h[(i<<1)+1].  To get this nice simple
    # arithmetic, we have to leave h[0] vacant.
    h = [None]                          # leave h[0] vacant
    for w, v in items:
        h.append(Node(w, v, w))
    for i in range(len(h) - 1, 1, -1):  # total up the tws
        h[i>>1].tw += h[i].tw           # add h[i] s total to its parent
    return h

def rws_heap_pop(h):
    gas = h[1].tw * random.random()     # start with a random amount of gas

    i = 1                     # start driving at the root
    while gas >= h[i].w:      # while we have enough gas to get past node i:
        gas -= h[i].w         #   drive past node i
        i <<= 1               #   move to first child
        if gas >= h[i].tw:    #   if we have enough gas:
            gas -= h[i].tw    #     drive past first child and descendants
            i += 1            #     move to second child
    w = h[i].w                # out of gas! h[i] is the selected node.
    v = h[i].v

    h[i].w = 0                # make sure this node isn t chosen again
    while i:                  # fix up total weights
        h[i].tw -= w
        i >>= 1
    return v

def random_weighted_sample_no_replacement(items, n):
    heap = rws_heap(items)              # just make a heap...
    for i in range(n):
        yield rws_heap_pop(heap)        # and pop n items off it.

If the sampling is with replacement, use the roulette-wheel selection technique (often used in genetic algorithms):

1. sort the weights
2. compute the cumulative weights
3. pick a random number in [0,1]*totalWeight
4. find the interval in which this number falls into
5. select the elements with the corresponding interval
6. repeat k times

If the sampling is without replacement, you can adapt the above technique by removing the selected element from the list after each iteration, then re-normalizing the weights so that their sum is 1 (valid probability distribution function)

I ve done this in Ruby

https://github.com/fl00r/pickup

require  pickup 
pond = {
  "selmon"  => 1,
  "carp" => 4,
  "crucian"  => 3,
  "herring" => 6,
  "sturgeon" => 8,
  "gudgeon" => 10,
  "minnow" => 20
}
pickup = Pickup.new(pond, uniq: true)
pickup.pick(3)
#=> [ "gudgeon", "herring", "minnow" ]
pickup.pick
#=> "herring"
pickup.pick
#=> "gudgeon"
pickup.pick
#=> "sturgeon"

If you want to generate large arrays of random integers with replacement, you can use piecewise linear interpolation. For example, using NumPy/SciPy:

import numpy
import scipy.interpolate

def weighted_randint(weights, size=None):
    """Given an n-element vector of weights, randomly sample
    integers up to n with probabilities proportional to weights"""
    n = weights.size
    # normalize so that the weights sum to unity
    weights = weights / numpy.linalg.norm(weights, 1)
    # cumulative sum of weights
    cumulative_weights = weights.cumsum()
    # piecewise-linear interpolating function whose domain is
    # the unit interval and whose range is the integers up to n
    f = scipy.interpolate.interp1d(
            numpy.hstack((0.0, weights)),
            numpy.arange(n + 1), kind= linear )
    return f(numpy.random.random(size=size)).astype(int)

This is not effective if you want to sample without replacement.

Here s a Go implementation from geodns:

package foo

import (
    "log"
    "math/rand"
)

type server struct {
    Weight int
    data   interface{}
}

func foo(servers []server) {
    // servers list is already sorted by the Weight attribute

    // number of items to pick
    max := 4

    result := make([]server, max)

    sum := 0
    for _, r := range servers {
        sum += r.Weight
    }

    for si := 0; si < max; si++ {
        n := rand.Intn(sum + 1)
        s := 0

        for i := range servers {
            s += int(servers[i].Weight)
            if s >= n {
                log.Println("Picked record", i, servers[i])
                sum -= servers[i].Weight
                result[si] = servers[i]

                // remove the server from the list
                servers = append(servers[:i], servers[i+1:]...)
                break
            }
        }
    }

    return result
}

If you want to pick x elements from a weighted set without replacement such that elements are chosen with a probability proportional to their weights:

import random

def weighted_choose_subset(weighted_set, count):
    """Return a random sample of count elements from a weighted set.

    weighted_set should be a sequence of tuples of the form 
    (item, weight), for example:  [( a , 1), ( b , 2), ( c , 3)]

    Each element from weighted_set shows up at most once in the
    result, and the relative likelihood of two particular elements
    showing up is equal to the ratio of their weights.

    This works as follows:

    1.) Line up the items along the number line from [0, the sum
    of all weights) such that each item occupies a segment of
    length equal to its weight.

    2.) Randomly pick a number "start" in the range [0, total
    weight / count).

    3.) Find all the points "start + n/count" (for all integers n
    such that the point is within our segments) and yield the set
    containing the items marked by those points.

    Note that this implementation may not return each possible
    subset.  For example, with the input ([( a : 1), ( b : 1),
    ( c : 1), ( d : 1)], 2), it may only produce the sets [ a ,
     c ] and [ b ,  d ], but it will do so such that the weights
    are respected.

    This implementation only works for nonnegative integral
    weights.  The highest weight in the input set must be less
    than the total weight divided by the count; otherwise it would
    be impossible to respect the weights while never returning
    that element more than once per invocation.
    """
    if count == 0:
        return []

    total_weight = 0
    max_weight = 0
    borders = []
    for item, weight in weighted_set:
        if weight < 0:
            raise RuntimeError("All weights must be positive integers")
        # Scale up weights so dividing total_weight / count doesn t truncate:
        weight *= count
        total_weight += weight
        borders.append(total_weight)
        max_weight = max(max_weight, weight)

    step = int(total_weight / count)

    if max_weight > step:
        raise RuntimeError(
            "Each weight must be less than total weight / count")

    next_stop = random.randint(0, step - 1)

    results = []
    current = 0
    for i in range(count):
        while borders[current] <= next_stop:
            current += 1
        results.append(weighted_set[current][0])
        next_stop += step

    return results

In the question you linked to, Kyle s solution would work with a trivial generalization. Scan the list and sum the total weights. Then the probability to choose an element should be:

1 - (1 - (#needed/(weight left)))/(weight at n). After visiting a node, subtract it s weight from the total. Also, if you need n and have n left, you have to stop explicitly.

You can check that with everything having weight 1, this simplifies to kyle s solution.

Edited: (had to rethink what twice as likely meant)

This one does exactly that with O(n) and no excess memory usage. I believe this is a clever and efficient solution easy to port to any language. The first two lines are just to populate sample data in Drupal.

function getNrandomGuysWithWeight($numitems){
  $q = db_query( SELECT id, weight FROM theTableWithTheData );
  $q = $q->fetchAll();

  $accum = 0;
  foreach($q as $r){
    $accum += $r->weight;
    $r->weight = $accum;
  }

  $out = array();

  while(count($out) < $numitems && count($q)){
    $n = rand(0,$accum);
    $lessaccum = NULL;
    $prevaccum = 0;
    $idxrm = 0;
    foreach($q as $i=>$r){
      if(($lessaccum == NULL) && ($n <= $r->weight)){
        $out[] = $r->id;
        $lessaccum = $r->weight- $prevaccum;
        $accum -= $lessaccum;
        $idxrm = $i;
      }else if($lessaccum){
        $r->weight -= $lessaccum;
      }
      $prevaccum = $r->weight;
    }
    unset($q[$idxrm]);
  }
  return $out;
}

I putting here a simple solution for picking 1 item, you can easily expand it for k items (Java style):

double random = Math.random();
double sum = 0;
for (int i = 0; i < items.length; i++) {
    val = items[i];
    sum += val.getValue();
    if (sum > random) {
        selected = val;
        break;
    }
}

I have implemented an algorithm similar to Jason Orendorff s idea in Rust here. My version additionally supports bulk operations: insert and remove (when you want to remove a bunch of items given by their ids, not through the weighted selection path) from the data structure in O(m + log n) time where m is the number of items to remove and n the number of items in stored.

Sampling wihout replacement with recursion - elegant and very short solution in c#

//how many ways we can choose 4 out of 60 students, so that every time we choose different 4

class Program
{
    static void Main(string[] args)
    {
        int group = 60;
        int studentsToChoose = 4;

        Console.WriteLine(FindNumberOfStudents(studentsToChoose, group));
    }

    private static int FindNumberOfStudents(int studentsToChoose, int group)
    {
        if (studentsToChoose == group || studentsToChoose == 0)
            return 1;

        return FindNumberOfStudents(studentsToChoose, group - 1) + FindNumberOfStudents(studentsToChoose - 1, group - 1);

    }
}

I just spent a few hours trying to get behind the algorithms underlying sampling without replacement out there and this topic is more complex than I initially thought. That s exciting! For the benefit of a future readers (have a good day!) I document my insights here including a ready to use function which respects the given inclusion probabilities further below. A nice and quick mathematical overview of the various methods can be found here: Tillé: Algorithms of sampling with equal or unequal probabilities. For example Jason s method can be found on page 46. The caveat with his method is that the weights are not proportional to the inclusion probabilities as also noted in the document. Actually, the i-th inclusion probabilities can be recursively computed as follows:

def inclusion_probability(i, weights, k):
    """
        Computes the inclusion probability of the i-th element
        in a randomly sampled k-tuple using Jason s algorithm
        (see https://stackoverflow.com/a/2149533/7729124)
    """
    if k <= 0: return 0
    cum_p = 0
    for j, weight in enumerate(weights):
        # compute the probability of j being selected considering the weights
        p = weight / sum(weights)

        if i == j:
            # if this is the target element, we don t have to go deeper,
            # since we know that i is included
            cum_p += p
        else:
            # if this is not the target element, than we compute the conditional
            # inclusion probability of i under the constraint that j is included
            cond_i = i if i < j else i-1
            cond_weights = weights[:j] + weights[j+1:]
            cond_p = inclusion_probability(cond_i, cond_weights, k-1)
            cum_p += p * cond_p
    return cum_p

And we can check the validity of the function above by comparing

In : for i in range(3): print(i, inclusion_probability(i, [1,2,3], 2))
0 0.41666666666666663
1 0.7333333333333333
2 0.85

to

In : import collections, itertools
In : sample_tester = lambda f: collections.Counter(itertools.chain(*(f() for _ in range(10000))))
In : sample_tester(lambda: random_weighted_sample_no_replacement([(1, a ),(2, b ),(3, c )],2))
Out: Counter({ a : 4198,  b : 7268,  c : 8534})

One way - also suggested in the document above - to specify the inclusion probabilities is to compute the weights from them. The whole complexity of the question at hand stems from the fact that one cannot do that directly since one basically has to invert the recursion formula, symbolically I claim this is impossible. Numerically it can be done using all kind of methods, e.g. Newton s method. However the complexity of inverting the Jacobian using plain Python becomes unbearable quickly, I really recommend looking into numpy.random.choice in this case.

Luckily there is method using plain Python which might or might not be sufficiently performant for your purposes, it works great if there aren t that many different weights. You can find the algorithm on page 75&76. It works by splitting up the sampling process into parts with the same inclusion probabilities, i.e. we can use random.sample again! I am not going to explain the principle here since the basics are nicely presented on page 69. Here is the code with hopefully a sufficient amount of comments:

def sample_no_replacement_exact(items, k, best_effort=False, random_=None, ε=1e-9):
    """
        Returns a random sample of k elements from items, where items is a list of
        tuples (weight, element). The inclusion probability of an element in the
        final sample is given by
           k * weight / sum(weights).

        Note that the function raises if a inclusion probability cannot be
        satisfied, e.g the following call is obviously illegal:
           sample_no_replacement_exact([(1, a ),(2, b )],2)
        Since selecting two elements means selecting both all the time,
         b  cannot be selected twice as often as  a . In general it can be hard to
        spot if the weights are illegal and the function does *not* always raise
        an exception in that case. To remedy the situation you can pass
        best_effort=True which redistributes the inclusion probability mass
        if necessary. Note that the inclusion probabilities will change
        if deemed necessary.

        The algorithm is based on the splitting procedure on page 75/76 in:
        http://www.eustat.eus/productosServicios/52.1_Unequal_prob_sampling.pdf
        Additional information can be found here:
        https://stackoverflow.com/questions/2140787/

        :param items: list of tuples of type weight,element
        :param k: length of resulting sample
        :param best_effort: fix inclusion probabilities if necessary,
                            (optional, defaults to False)
        :param random_: random module to use (optional, defaults to the
                        standard random module)
        :param ε: fuzziness parameter when testing for zero in the context
                  of floating point arithmetic (optional, defaults to 1e-9)
        :return: random sample set of size k
        :exception: throws ValueError in case of bad parameters,
                    throws AssertionError in case of algorithmic impossibilities
    """
    # random_ defaults to the random submodule
    if not random_:
        random_ = random

    # special case empty return set
    if k <= 0:
        return set()

    if k > len(items):
        raise ValueError("resulting tuple length exceeds number of elements (k > n)")

    # sort items by weight
    items = sorted(items, key=lambda item: item[0])

    # extract the weights and elements
    weights, elements = list(zip(*items))

    # compute the inclusion probabilities (short: π) of the elements
    scaling_factor = k / sum(weights)
    π = [scaling_factor * weight for weight in weights]

    # in case of best_effort: if a inclusion probability exceeds 1,
    # try to rebalance the probabilities such that:
    # a) no probability exceeds 1,
    # b) the probabilities still sum to k, and
    # c) the probability masses flow from top to bottom:
    #    [0.2, 0.3, 1.5] -> [0.2, 0.8, 1]
    # (remember that π is sorted)
    if best_effort and π[-1] > 1 + ε:
        # probability mass we still we have to distribute
        debt = 0.
        for i in reversed(range(len(π))):
            if π[i] > 1.:
                # an  offender , take away excess
                debt += π[i] - 1.
                π[i] = 1.
            else:
                # case π[i] < 1, i.e.  save  element
                # maximum we can transfer from debt to π[i] and still not
                # exceed 1 is computed by the minimum of:
                # a) 1 - π[i], and
                # b) debt
                max_transfer = min(debt, 1. - π[i])
                debt -= max_transfer
                π[i] += max_transfer
        assert debt < ε, "best effort rebalancing failed (impossible)"

    # make sure we are talking about probabilities
    if any(not (0 - ε <= π_i <= 1 + ε) for π_i in π):
        raise ValueError("inclusion probabilities not satisfiable: {}" 
                         .format(list(zip(π, elements))))

    # special case equal probabilities
    # (up to fuzziness parameter, remember that π is sorted)
    if π[-1] < π[0] + ε:
        return set(random_.sample(elements, k))

    # compute the two possible lambda values, see formula 7 on page 75
    # (remember that π is sorted)
    λ1 = π[0] * len(π) / k
    λ2 = (1 - π[-1]) * len(π) / (len(π) - k)
    λ = min(λ1, λ2)

    # there are two cases now, see also page 69
    # CASE 1
    # with probability λ we are in the equal probability case
    # where all elements have the same inclusion probability
    if random_.random() < λ:
        return set(random_.sample(elements, k))

    # CASE 2:
    # with probability 1-λ we are in the case of a new sample without
    # replacement problem which is strictly simpler,
    # it has the following new probabilities (see page 75, π^{(2)}):
    new_π = [
        (π_i - λ * k / len(π))
        /
        (1 - λ)
        for π_i in π
    ]
    new_items = list(zip(new_π, elements))

    # the first few probabilities might be 0, remove them
    # NOTE: we make sure that floating point issues do not arise
    #       by using the fuzziness parameter
    while new_items and new_items[0][0] < ε:
        new_items = new_items[1:]

    # the last few probabilities might be 1, remove them and mark them as selected
    # NOTE: we make sure that floating point issues do not arise
    #       by using the fuzziness parameter
    selected_elements = set()
    while new_items and new_items[-1][0] > 1 - ε:
        selected_elements.add(new_items[-1][1])
        new_items = new_items[:-1]

    # the algorithm reduces the length of the sample problem,
    # it is guaranteed that:
    # if λ = λ1: the first item has probability 0
    # if λ = λ2: the last item has probability 1
    assert len(new_items) < len(items), "problem was not simplified (impossible)"

    # recursive call with the simpler sample problem
    # NOTE: we have to make sure that the selected elements are included
    return sample_no_replacement_exact(
        new_items,
        k - len(selected_elements),
        best_effort=best_effort,
        random_=random_,
        ε=ε
    ) | selected_elements

Example:

In : sample_no_replacement_exact([(1, a ),(2, b ),(3, c )],2)
Out: { b ,  c }

In : import collections, itertools
In : sample_tester = lambda f: collections.Counter(itertools.chain(*(f() for _ in range(10000))))
In : sample_tester(lambda: sample_no_replacement_exact([(1, a ),(2, b ),(3, c ),(4, d )],2))
Out: Counter({ a : 2048,  b : 4051,  c : 5979,  d : 7922})

The weights sum up to 10, hence the inclusion probabilities compute to: a → 20%, b → 40%, c → 60%, d → 80%. (Sum: 200% = k.) It works!

Just one word of caution for the productive use of this function, it can be very hard to spot illegal inputs for the weights. An obvious illegal example is

In: sample_no_replacement_exact([(1, a ),(2, b )],2)
ValueError: inclusion probabilities not satisfiable: [(0.6666666666666666,  a ), (1.3333333333333333,  b )]

b cannot appear twice as often as a since both have to be always be selected. There are more subtle examples. To avoid an exception in production just use best_effort=True, which rebalances the inclusion probability mass such that we have always a valid distribution. Obviously this might change the inclusion probabilities.

I used a associative map (weight,object). for example:

{
(10,"low"),
(100,"mid"),
(10000,"large")
}

total=10110

peek a random number between 0 and total and iterate over the keys until this number fits in a given range.