Second Biggest Value in Objects | Dataford Interview Questions

An Mphasis Helix workflow receives a list of objects representing ranked items. Each object contains a numeric field such as score, priority, or rating. Return the first object whose field value is the second-highest distinct value in the list.

Use a single pass when possible. If several objects share the second-highest value, return the one appearing first in the input list.

Formal Specification

Implement second_largest_object(objects, key).

objects is a non-empty list of dictionaries.
key is a string naming a field present in every dictionary.
Each objects[i][key] is an integer.
Return the dictionary with the second-highest distinct value for key.
The input always contains at least two distinct values.

Constraints

2 <= len(objects) <= 10^5
-10^9 <= objects[i][key] <= 10^9
Every object contains key with an integer value
At least two distinct values exist

Function Signature

def second_largest_object(objects, key):

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