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Consider a toy list

l = {x[2],x[32],x[43],x[56],x[72]};

I would like to find the position of the first element within this list, for which x[y] is such that y>N where N is a positive integer that I will specify. In case if N is bigger than any label of any x[y], then the result should be zero. So for example:

getPos[l,35]

3

getPos[l,60]

5

getPos[l,80]

0

How can I do that in an efficient manner?

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    $\begingroup$ Maybe I don't understand the question but FirstPosition? $\endgroup$
    – unlikely
    Feb 22, 2016 at 23:10
  • $\begingroup$ Beware of things like x[n_] := 3; l = {x[2],x[32],x[43],x[56],x[72]}; $\endgroup$
    – Dr. belisarius
    Feb 22, 2016 at 23:13

2 Answers 2

Reset to default
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For default you can use third arg as in 

p[n_] := First@FirstPosition[l, x[k_] /; k >= n, {0}]
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Thanks to a comment by unlikely here is the solution:

getPos[l_List,myN_Integer]:=FirstPosition[l,x[qq_Integer] /; qq > myN,{0}][[1]]
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    $\begingroup$ Better to use n than N. $\endgroup$
    – bbgodfrey
    Feb 22, 2016 at 23:16
  • $\begingroup$ Fixed it to something that starts with a lower case letter. $\endgroup$
    – Kagaratsch
    Feb 22, 2016 at 23:17

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