dedupe() crashes with max() empty when an item reduces to an empty string under the default processor

[pramodavansaber]

Summary

dedupe() calls extractBests(..., score_cutoff=threshold) per item and then max(matches, ...). When an item is reduced to the empty string by the default processor (utils.full_process), every comparison scores 0, so extractBests returns [] (default threshold 70) and max([]) raises ValueError: max() arg is an empty sequence. The code even warns that a processor-emptied query makes all comparisons score 0, then calls max() unconditionally.

Reproduction

from thefuzz.process import dedupe
dedupe(['###', 'apple', 'apple pie'])
# ValueError: max() iterable argument is empty

(utils.full_process('###') yields ''.)

Expected

dedupe() handles an empty-processed item gracefully (e.g. keeps it as its own cluster), rather than crashing.

Actual

Uncaught ValueError from max([]).

Environment

thefuzz 0.22.1 (master @ 1ba86f3), Python 3.12.