Class TSearchTree implements a trie (also called "digital tree" or "prefix tree", see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trie).
In SearchStrings folder you can find sample application that allows to compare performance of trie search and linear (sequential) search.
Delphi 10.2 Tokyo or newer.
uses uSearchStrings, uIntList;
var
LSearcher: TSearchTree;
LSearchList: TStringList;
LFoundList: TIntList;
LFoundAt, LFoundIndex: Integer;
begin
LSearcher := TSearchTree.Create;
LSearchList := TStringList.Create;
LFoundList := TIntList.Create;
try
LSearchList.Add('john');
LSearchList.Add('mary');
LSearcher.MatchType := smtContains;
LSearcher.CaseSensitive := False;
LSearcher.Build(LSearchList);
LFoundAt := LSearcher.FindMatch('Doe John', LFoundIndex);
if LFoundAt > 0 then begin
//LFoundAt contains 5 - position (>= 1) of the found string from LSearchList ('john')
//LFoundIndex contains 0 - index of the found string ('john')
end;
if LSearcher.FindAllMatches('John loves Mary', LFoundList) then begin
//LFoundList contains [0, 1] - indexes of found strings ('john' and 'mary')
end;
finally
LFoundList.Free;
LSearchList.Free;
LSearcher.Free;
end;
end;BSD 2-Clause License.
Search Strings Sample project uses TReadOnlyCachedFileStream and TWriteCachedFileStream by David Heffernan (https://stackoverflow.com/questions/5639531/buffered-files-for-faster-disk-access)