Problem statement
Given an input string s, reverse the order of the words.
A word is defined as a sequence of non-space characters. The words in s will be separated by at least one space.
Return a string of the words in reverse order concatenated by a single space.
Note that s may contain leading or trailing spaces or multiple spaces between two words. The returned string should only have a single space separating the words. Do not include any extra spaces.
Problem statement taken from: https://leetcode.com/problems/reverse-words-in-a-string
Example 1:
Input: s = 'the sky is blue'
Output: 'blue is sky the'
Example 2:
Input: s = ' hello world '
Output: 'world hello'
Explanation: Your reversed string should not contain leading or trailing spaces.
Example 3:
Input: s = 'a good example'
Output: 'example good a'
Explanation: You need to reduce multiple spaces between two words to a single space in the reversed string.
Constraints:
- 1 <= s.length <= 10^4
- s contains English letters (upper-case and lower-case), digits, and spaces ' '
- There is at least one word in s
Explanation
Brute Force approach: Using Stack
We can solve the problem using a Stack data structure. We split the input string s into words and put them on the stack. Once we are done reading the input string, we pop the words from stack and stick them together.
A C++ snippet of this approach is as follows:
string reverseWords(string s) {
stack<string> st;
int i = 0, n = s.length();
string c = '';
while(i < n) {
if(s[i] == ' ') {
if(c.length() > 0) {
st.push(c);
c.clear();
}
} else {
c += s[i];
}
i++;
}
if(c.length() > 0)
st.push(c);
string res = '';
while(!st.empty()) {
res += st.top();
st.pop();
res += ' ';
}
res.pop_back();
return res;
}
The time complexity of the above approach is O(n). Since we are using a Stack data structure the space complexity is O(n).
Optimized solution: Using pointers
If we observe the above solution, we are pushing the word on a stack when we encounter a space ' '. Instead of a stack we can use a temp string. We traverse the string from end to beginning. We keep adding the characters to the temp string until a white space is found.
When we encounter a white space, we store the temporary string to the resultant string variable and then empty the temp string. Let's check the algorithm to understand the approach clearly.
Algorithm
- set result, temp = '', ''
set n = s.length()
- loop for i = n - 1; i >= 1; i--
- if s[i] == ' '
- if temp != ''
- result = result + temp + ' '
- temp = ''
- if end
- else
- temp = s[i] + temp
- if end
- for end
- update result = result + temp
- if result[result.length() - 1] == ' '
- result.erase(result.length() - 1)
- if end
- return result
The time complexity of the above approach is O(n). We are not using a stack anymore and using a temp variable, the space complexity is reduced to O(1).
C++ solution
class Solution {
public:
string reverseWords(string s) {
string result = '';
int n = s.length();
string temp;
for(int i = n - 1; i >= 0; i--){
if(s[i] == ' ') {
if(temp != '') {
result = result + temp + ' ';
temp = '';
}
} else {
temp = s[i] + temp;
}
}
result = result + temp;
if(result[result.length() - 1] == ' ') {
result.erase(result.length() - 1);
}
return result;
}
};
Golang solution
func reverseWords(s string) string {
result, temp := '', ''
n := len(s)
for i := n - 1; i >= 0; i-- {
if s[i] == ' ' {
if temp != '' {
result = result + temp + ' '
temp = ''
}
} else {
temp = string(s[i]) + temp
}
}
result = result + temp
if result[len(result) - 1] == ' ' {
result = result[:len(result) - 1]
}
return result
}
JavaScript solution
var reverseWords = function(s) {
let result = '', temp = '';
let n = s.length;
for(let i = n - 1; i >= 0; i--){
if(s[i] == ' ') {
if(temp != '') {
result = result + temp + ' ';
temp = '';
}
} else {
temp = s[i] + temp;
}
}
result = result + temp;
if(result[result.length - 1] == ' ') {
result = result.slice(0, -1);
}
return result;
};
Let's dry-run our algorithm to see how the solution works.
Input: s = 'the sky is blue'
Step 1: result = '', temp = ''
n = s.length()
= 15
Step 2: loop for i = n - 1; i >= 0
i = 15 - 1 = 14
i >= 0
14 >= 0
true
if s[i] == ' '
s[14] == ' '
'e' == ' '
false
else
temp = s[i] + temp
= s[14] + ''
= 'e' + ''
= 'e'
i--
i = 13
Step 3: loop for i >= 0
13 >= 0
true
if s[i] == ' '
s[13] == ' '
'u' == ' '
false
else
temp = s[i] + temp
= s[13] + 'e'
= 'u' + 'e'
= 'ue'
i--
i = 12
Step 4: loop for i >= 0
12 >= 0
true
if s[i] == ' '
s[12] == ' '
'l' == ' '
false
else
temp = s[i] + temp
= s[12] + 'ue'
= 'l' + 'ue'
= 'lue'
i--
i = 11
Step 5: loop for i >= 0
11 >= 0
true
if s[i] == ' '
s[11] == ' '
'b' == ' '
false
else
temp = s[i] + temp
= s[11] + 'lue'
= 'b' + 'lue'
= 'blue'
i--
i = 10
Step 6: loop for i >= 0
10 >= 0
true
if s[i] == ' '
s[10] == ' '
' ' == ' '
true
if temp != ''
'blue' != ''
true
result = result + temp + ' '
= '' + 'blue' + ' '
= 'blue '
temp = ''
i--
i = 9
Step 7: loop for i >= 0
9 >= 0
true
if s[i] == ' '
s[9] == ' '
's' == ' '
false
else
temp = s[i] + temp
= s[9] + ''
= 's' + ''
= 's'
i--
i = 8
Step 8: loop for i >= 0
8 >= 0
true
if s[i] == ' '
s[8] == ' '
'i' == ' '
false
else
temp = s[i] + temp
= s[8] + 's'
= 'i' + 's'
= 'is'
i--
i = 7
Step 9: loop for i >= 0
7 >= 0
true
if s[i] == ' '
s[7] == ' '
' ' == ' '
true
if temp != ''
'is' != ''
true
result = result + temp + ' '
= 'blue ' + 'is' + ' '
= 'blue is '
temp = ''
i--
i = 6
Step 10: loop for i >= 0
6 >= 0
true
if s[i] == ' '
s[6] == ' '
'y' == ' '
false
else
temp = s[i] + temp
= s[6] + ''
= 'y' + ''
= 'y'
i--
i = 5
Step 11: loop for i >= 0
5 >= 0
true
if s[i] == ' '
s[5] == ' '
'k' == ' '
false
else
temp = s[i] + temp
= s[5] + 'y'
= 'k' + 'y'
= 'ky'
i--
i = 4
Step 12: loop for i >= 0
4 >= 0
true
if s[i] == ' '
s[4] == ' '
's' == ' '
false
else
temp = s[i] + temp
= s[5] + 'ky'
= 's' + 'ky'
= 'sky'
i--
i = 3
Step 13: loop for i >= 0
3 >= 0
true
if s[i] == ' '
s[3] == ' '
' ' == ' '
true
if temp != ''
'sky' != ''
true
result = result + temp + ' '
= 'blue is ' + 'sky' + ' '
= 'blue is sky '
temp = ''
i--
i = 2
Step 14: loop for i >= 0
2 >= 0
true
if s[i] == ' '
s[2] == ' '
'e' == ' '
false
else
temp = s[i] + temp
= s[2] + ''
= 'e' + ''
= 'e'
i--
i = 1
Step 15: loop for i >= 0
1 >= 0
true
if s[i] == ' '
s[1] == ' '
'h' == ' '
false
else
temp = s[i] + temp
= s[1] + 'e'
= 'h' + 'e'
= 'he'
i--
i = 0
Step 16: loop for i >= 0
0 >= 0
true
if s[i] == ' '
s[0] == ' '
't' == ' '
false
else
temp = s[i] + temp
= s[0] + 'he'
= 't' + 'he'
= 'the'
i--
i = -1
Step 17: loop for i >= 0
-1 >= 0
false
Step 18: result = result + temp
= 'blue is sky ' + 'the'
= 'blue is sky the'
Step 19: if result[result.length() - 1] == ' '
result[15 - 1] == ' '
result[14] == ' '
'e' == ' '
false
Step 20: return result
We return the result as 'blue is sky the'.
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