Solved LeetCode 1528: Shuffle String in Java

💡 LeetCode 1768 – Merge Strings Alternately 💡 Today, I solved LeetCode Problem #1768, a delightful string manipulation problem that strengthens the fundamentals of character traversal and string building using StringBuilder in Java. 🧩 Problem Overview: You’re given two strings, word1 and word2. Your task is to merge them alternately — take one character from each string in turn, and if one string is longer, append its remaining characters at the end. 👉 Examples: Input → word1 = "abc", word2 = "pqr" → Output → "apbqcr" Input → word1 = "ab", word2 = "pqrs" → Output → "apbqrs" Input → word1 = "abcd", word2 = "pq" → Output → "apbqcd" 💡 Approach: 1️⃣ Use two pointers i and j to iterate through both strings. 2️⃣ Append one character from word1, then one from word2, alternately. 3️⃣ Continue until both strings are fully traversed. 4️⃣ Return the merged string using StringBuilder.toString(). ⚙️ Complexity Analysis: ✅ Time Complexity: O(n + m) — Each character from both strings is processed once. ✅ Space Complexity: O(n + m) — For the resulting merged string. ✨ Key Takeaways: Reinforced understanding of two-pointer traversal and StringBuilder for efficient string concatenation. Showed how simple looping logic can elegantly handle strings of unequal lengths. Practiced writing clean, readable, and efficient code for basic string problems. 🌱 Reflection: Even simple problems like this one are valuable for sharpening algorithmic thinking and code clarity. Mastering these fundamental string operations lays the groundwork for tackling more advanced text-processing challenges later on. 🚀 #LeetCode #1768 #Java #StringManipulation #TwoPointerTechnique #DSA #ProblemSolving #CleanCode #AlgorithmicThinking #DailyCoding #ConsistencyIsKey

🌳 Day 65 of #LeetCode Journey 🔹 Problem: 106. Construct Binary Tree from Inorder and Postorder Traversal 🔹 Difficulty: Medium 🔹 Language: Java Today’s problem is about rebuilding a binary tree when you’re given its inorder and postorder traversal arrays. 🧩 Key Idea: The last element in postorder is always the root. In inorder traversal, elements to the left of the root are in the left subtree, and elements to the right are in the right subtree. We recursively build the tree using this property. 💡 Approach: Start from the end of the postorder array to get the root. Use a hashmap to store inorder indices for O(1) lookup. Recursively construct the right subtree first, then the left subtree (since we’re moving backward in postorder). 🧠 Concepts reinforced: Recursion HashMap for index lookup Understanding inorder & postorder relationships 🔥 Another step forward in mastering tree construction problems! #LeetCode #100DaysOfCode #Java #CodingChallenge #DataStructures #BinaryTree #Recursion #ProblemSolving #ProgrammingJourney

💡 LeetCode 3110 – Score of a String 💡 Today, I solved LeetCode Problem #3110: Score of a String, a neat little challenge that emphasizes understanding of ASCII values and absolute differences in Java strings. 🔠✨ 🧩 Problem Overview: You’re given a string s. The score of the string is defined as the sum of the absolute differences between the ASCII values of consecutive characters. Return the total score. 👉 Example: Input → "hello" Output → 13 Explanation → |'e'-'h'| + |'l'-'e'| + |'l'-'l'| + |'o'-'l'| = 3 + 7 + 0 + 3 = 13 💡 Approach: 1️⃣ Initialize a variable sum to store the total score. 2️⃣ Traverse the string from index 1 to end. 3️⃣ For each pair of consecutive characters, find their ASCII difference using Math.abs(). 4️⃣ Add the difference to sum and return it. ⚙️ Complexity Analysis: ✅ Time Complexity: O(n) — Single traversal of the string. ✅ Space Complexity: O(1) — Constant extra space. ✨ Key Takeaways: Strengthened understanding of character encoding and ASCII values. Reinforced clean looping logic and mathematical precision in Java. A great example of how simplicity can elegantly solve a real problem. 🌱 Reflection: Even the smallest coding challenges help sharpen attention to detail — from understanding data types to leveraging built-in functions effectively. Consistency is what transforms learning into mastery. 🚀 #LeetCode #3110 #Java #StringManipulation #ASCII #ProblemSolving #DSA #CodingJourney #CleanCode #AlgorithmicThinking #ConsistencyIsKey

✅ Day 35 of #100DaysOfCode Challenge 📘 LeetCode Problem 112: Path Sum 🧩 Problem Statement: Given the root of a binary tree and an integer targetSum, return true if there exists a root-to-leaf path whose sum of node values equals targetSum. Example: Input: root = [5,4,8,11,null,13,4,7,2,null,null,null,1], targetSum = 22 Output: true Explanation: Path 5 → 4 → 11 → 2 gives the sum = 22 ✅ 💡 Simple Approach: If the tree is empty → return false If it’s a leaf node → check if its value equals targetSum Otherwise → subtract node value and check left and right recursively 💻 Easiest Java Code: class Solution { public boolean hasPathSum(TreeNode root, int sum) { if (root == null) return false; if (root.left == null && root.right == null && root.val == sum) return true; sum = sum - root.val; return hasPathSum(root.left, sum) || hasPathSum(root.right, sum); } } ⚙️ Complexity: ⏱️ Time: O(n) → visit each node once 💾 Space: O(h) → recursion stack (h = height of tree) 🌿 Small code, big concept — recursion makes trees easy 🌱 #Day35 #100DaysOfCode #LeetCode #Java #DSA #BinaryTree #Recursion #CodingChallenge

✅ Day 35 of #100DaysOfCode Challenge 📘 LeetCode Problem 112: Path Sum 🧩 Problem Statement: Given the root of a binary tree and an integer targetSum, return true if there exists a root-to-leaf path whose sum of node values equals targetSum. Example: Input: root = [5,4,8,11,null,13,4,7,2,null,null,null,1], targetSum = 22 Output: true Explanation: Path 5 → 4 → 11 → 2 gives the sum = 22 ✅ 💡 Simple Approach: If the tree is empty → return false If it’s a leaf node → check if its value equals targetSum Otherwise → subtract node value and check left and right recursively 💻 Easiest Java Code: class Solution { public boolean hasPathSum(TreeNode root, int sum) { if (root == null) return false; if (root.left == null && root.right == null && root.val == sum) return true; sum = sum - root.val; return hasPathSum(root.left, sum) || hasPathSum(root.right, sum); } } ⚙️ Complexity: ⏱️ Time: O(n) → visit each node once 💾 Space: O(h) → recursion stack (h = height of tree) 🌿 Small code, big concept — recursion makes trees easy 🌱 #Day35 #100DaysOfCode #LeetCode #Java #DSA #BinaryTree #Recursion #CodingChallenge

🚀 Day 18 of My DSA Journey — Rotate String | Valid Anagram | Sort Characters by Frequency (LeetCode #796, #242, #451) Today, I tackled three interesting String problems that sharpened my understanding of string manipulation, frequency counting, and sorting logic in Java 💡 🧩 Problem 1: Rotate String (LeetCode #796) 🎯 Goal: Check if one string can be obtained by rotating another. 👉 Example: s = "abcde", goal = "cdeab" → ✅ true 💭 Approach: If lengths differ → return false. If (s + s) contains goal → it’s a rotated version. ✨ Key Takeaway: Clever use of concatenation simplifies rotation logic. 🧩 Problem 2: Valid Anagram (LeetCode #242) 🎯 Goal: Check if two strings are anagrams. 👉 Example: s = "anagram", t = "nagaram" → ✅ true 💭 Approach: Use an integer array of size 26. Increment counts for s, decrement for t. If all counts are 0 → valid anagram! ✨ Key Takeaway: ASCII-based frequency counting is both fast and memory-efficient. 🧩 Problem 3: Sort Characters by Frequency (LeetCode #451) 🎯 Goal: Sort characters in descending order of frequency. 👉 Example: s = "Aabb" → ✅ Output: "bbAa" 💭 Approach: Count frequency of each character. Store in a list of (char, count) pairs. Sort list by count (descending). ✨ Key Takeaway: Learned how sorting and frequency analysis can work together elegantly. 💬 Reflection: These problems taught me the power of simple but strategic operations like string concatenation, ASCII arithmetic, and sorting logic — all crucial for writing clean, optimized code. #DSA #Java #LeetCode #CodingJourney #ProblemSolving #StringManipulation #100DaysOfDSA #RotateString #ValidAnagram #FrequencySort

🚀 Day 29 of #100DaysOfCode – LeetCode Problem #643: Maximum Average Subarray I 🧩 Problem: Given an integer array nums and an integer k, find the contiguous subarray of length k that has the maximum average value. 💡 Approach: This problem is a great example of the Sliding Window Technique 🪟 Calculate the sum of the first k elements. Then slide the window by one element at a time — subtract the element that goes out, add the new one coming in. Keep track of the maximum sum seen. Return the maximum average (maxSum / k). 💻 Java Code: class Solution { public double findMaxAverage(int[] nums, int k) { double sum = 0; for (int i = 0; i < k; i++) { sum += nums[i]; } double max = sum; for (int i = k; i < nums.length; i++) { sum += nums[i] - nums[i - k]; max = Math.max(max, sum); } return max / k; } } ⏱️ Complexity: Time: O(n) Space: O(1) ✅ Result: Accepted (Runtime: 0 ms) This one reinforces how sliding window optimizations can drastically simplify what looks like a brute-force problem!

✅Day 42 : Leetcode 154 - Find Minimum in Rotated Sorted Array-2 #60DayOfLeetcodeChallenge 🧩 Problem Statement You are given an array nums that is sorted in ascending order and then rotated between 1 and n times. The array may contain duplicates. Your task is to find and return the minimum element in the rotated sorted array. You must minimize the number of overall operations as much as possible. 💡 My Approach I used a modified binary search technique to handle both rotation and duplicates. Initialize two pointers — low = 0 and high = n - 1. Calculate the middle index mid = low + (high - low) / 2. Update the answer as ans = min(ans, nums[mid]). If nums[low] == nums[mid] && nums[mid] == nums[high], move both low++ and high-- to skip duplicates. If the left half is sorted (nums[low] <= nums[mid]), update the answer and move to the right half (low = mid + 1). Otherwise, move to the left half (high = mid - 1). Continue until low > high. This efficiently finds the minimum even when duplicates exist. ⏱️ Time Complexity Worst Case: O(n) — when many duplicates exist. Average Case: O(log n) — behaves like binary search when duplicates are few. #BinarySearch #LeetCode #RotatedArray #Java #DSA #ProblemSolving #CodingPractice #LeetCodeHard

#100DaysOfCode – Day 66 String Manipulation & Primitive Decomposition 🧩 Task: Given a valid parentheses string, decompose it into its primitive components and then remove the outermost parentheses from each component. Example: Input: s = "(()())(())" Primitive Decomposition: "(()())" + "(())" After removing outermost parentheses: "()()" + "()" Output: "()()()" My Approach: I iterated through the string while keeping a counter to track the balance of open parentheses. When an opening parenthesis ( was found, I incremented the counter. If the count was greater than 1, it meant this parenthesis was not an outermost one, so I appended it to the result. When a closing parenthesis ) was found, I only appended it if the counter was greater than 1 before decrementing. This ensures the final closing parenthesis of a primitive part is excluded. This simple counter-based approach effectively identifies and removes the correct parentheses without needing a more complex data structure like a stack. Time Complexity: O(N) Space Complexity: O(N) Sometimes, a simple counter is all you need to elegantly handle nested structures. It can be a clean and efficient alternative to more complex data structures for certain problems. #takeUforward #100DaysOfCode #Java #ProblemSolving #LeetCode #DataStructures #Algorithms #StringManipulation #CodeNewbie