# Posts published in “Algorithms”

Given an array of numbers arr. A sequence of numbers is called an arithmetic progression if the difference between any two consecutive elements is the same.

Return true if the array can be rearranged to form an arithmetic progression, otherwise, return false.

Example 1:

Input: arr = [3,5,1]
Output: true
Explanation: We can reorder the elements as [1,3,5] or [5,3,1] with differences 2 and -2 respectively, between each consecutive elements.


Example 2:

Input: arr = [1,2,4]
Output: false
Explanation: There is no way to reorder the elements to obtain an arithmetic progression.


Constraints:

• 2 <= arr.length <= 1000
• -10^6 <= arr[i] <= 10^6

## Solution 1: Sort and check.

Time complexity: O(nlog)
Space complexity: O(1)

## Solution 2: Rearrange the array

Find min / max / diff and put each element into its correct position by swapping elements in place.

Time complexity: O(n)
Space complexity: O(1)

## C++

Given two positive integers n and k.

A factor of an integer n is defined as an integer i where n % i == 0.

Consider a list of all factors of n sorted in ascending order, return the kth factor in this list or return -1 if n has less than k factors.

Example 1:

Input: n = 12, k = 3
Output: 3
Explanation: Factors list is [1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 12], the 3rd factor is 3.


Example 2:

Input: n = 7, k = 2
Output: 7
Explanation: Factors list is [1, 7], the 2nd factor is 7.


Example 3:

Input: n = 4, k = 4
Output: -1
Explanation: Factors list is [1, 2, 4], there is only 3 factors. We should return -1.


Example 4:

Input: n = 1, k = 1
Output: 1
Explanation: Factors list is [1], the 1st factor is 1.


Example 5:

Input: n = 1000, k = 3
Output: 4
Explanation: Factors list is [1, 2, 4, 5, 8, 10, 20, 25, 40, 50, 100, 125, 200, 250, 500, 1000].


Constraints:

• 1 <= k <= n <= 1000

## Solution: Brute Force

Time complexity: O(n)
Space complexity: O(1)

## C++

Given an array of unique integers salary where salary[i] is the salary of the employee i.

Return the average salary of employees excluding the minimum and maximum salary.

Example 1:

Input: salary = [4000,3000,1000,2000]
Output: 2500.00000
Explanation: Minimum salary and maximum salary are 1000 and 4000 respectively.
Average salary excluding minimum and maximum salary is (2000+3000)/2= 2500


Example 2:

Input: salary = [1000,2000,3000]
Output: 2000.00000
Explanation: Minimum salary and maximum salary are 1000 and 3000 respectively.
Average salary excluding minimum and maximum salary is (2000)/1= 2000


Example 3:

Input: salary = [6000,5000,4000,3000,2000,1000]
Output: 3500.00000


Example 4:

Input: salary = [8000,9000,2000,3000,6000,1000]
Output: 4750.00000


Constraints:

• 3 <= salary.length <= 100
• 10^3 <= salary[i] <= 10^6
• salary[i] is unique.
• Answers within 10^-5 of the actual value will be accepted as correct.

## Solution: Brute Force

Time complexity: O(n)
Space complexity: O(1)

## C++

Your country has an infinite number of lakes. Initially, all the lakes are empty, but when it rains over the nth lake, the nth lake becomes full of water. If it rains over a lake which is full of water, there will be a flood. Your goal is to avoid the flood in any lake.

Given an integer array rains where:

• rains[i] > 0 means there will be rains over the rains[i] lake.
• rains[i] == 0 means there are no rains this day and you can choose one lake this day and dry it.

Return an array ans where:

• ans.length == rains.length
• ans[i] == -1 if rains[i] > 0.
• ans[i] is the lake you choose to dry in the ith day if rains[i] == 0.

If there are multiple valid answers return any of them. If it is impossible to avoid flood return an empty array.

Notice that if you chose to dry a full lake, it becomes empty, but if you chose to dry an empty lake, nothing changes. (see example 4)

Example 1:

Input: rains = [1,2,3,4]
Output: [-1,-1,-1,-1]
Explanation: After the first day full lakes are [1]
After the second day full lakes are [1,2]
After the third day full lakes are [1,2,3]
After the fourth day full lakes are [1,2,3,4]
There's no day to dry any lake and there is no flood in any lake.


Example 2:

Input: rains = [1,2,0,0,2,1]
Output: [-1,-1,2,1,-1,-1]
Explanation: After the first day full lakes are [1]
After the second day full lakes are [1,2]
After the third day, we dry lake 2. Full lakes are [1]
After the fourth day, we dry lake 1. There is no full lakes.
After the fifth day, full lakes are [2].
After the sixth day, full lakes are [1,2].
It is easy that this scenario is flood-free. [-1,-1,1,2,-1,-1] is another acceptable scenario.


Example 3:

Input: rains = [1,2,0,1,2]
Output: []
Explanation: After the second day, full lakes are  [1,2]. We have to dry one lake in the third day.
After that, it will rain over lakes [1,2]. It's easy to prove that no matter which lake you choose to dry in the 3rd day, the other one will flood.


Example 4:

Input: rains = [69,0,0,0,69]
Output: [-1,69,1,1,-1]
Explanation: Any solution on one of the forms [-1,69,x,y,-1], [-1,x,69,y,-1] or [-1,x,y,69,-1] is acceptable where 1 <= x,y <= 10^9


Example 5:

Input: rains = [10,20,20]
Output: []
Explanation: It will rain over lake 20 two consecutive days. There is no chance to dry any lake.


Constraints:

• 1 <= rains.length <= 10^5
• 0 <= rains[i] <= 10^9

## Solution: Binary Search

Store the days we can dry a lake in a treeset.
Store the last day when a lake becomes full in a hashtable.
Whenever we encounter a full lake, try to find the first available day that we can dry it. If no such day, return no answer.

Time complexity: O(nlogn)
Space complexity: O(n)

## C++

Given an integer array bloomDay, an integer m and an integer k.

We need to make m bouquets. To make a bouquet, you need to use k adjacent flowers from the garden.

The garden consists of n flowers, the ith flower will bloom in the bloomDay[i] and then can be used in exactly one bouquet.

Return the minimum number of days you need to wait to be able to make m bouquets from the garden. If it is impossible to make m bouquets return -1.

Example 1:

Input: bloomDay = [1,10,3,10,2], m = 3, k = 1
Output: 3
Explanation: Let's see what happened in the first three days. x means flower bloomed and _ means flower didn't bloom in the garden.
We need 3 bouquets each should contain 1 flower.
After day 1: [x, _, _, _, _]   // we can only make one bouquet.
After day 2: [x, _, _, _, x]   // we can only make two bouquets.
After day 3: [x, _, x, _, x]   // we can make 3 bouquets. The answer is 3.


Example 2:

Input: bloomDay = [1,10,3,10,2], m = 3, k = 2
Output: -1
Explanation: We need 3 bouquets each has 2 flowers, that means we need 6 flowers. We only have 5 flowers so it is impossible to get the needed bouquets and we return -1.


Example 3:

Input: bloomDay = [7,7,7,7,12,7,7], m = 2, k = 3
Output: 12
Explanation: We need 2 bouquets each should have 3 flowers.
Here's the garden after the 7 and 12 days:
After day 7: [x, x, x, x, _, x, x]
We can make one bouquet of the first three flowers that bloomed. We cannot make another bouquet from the last three flowers that bloomed because they are not adjacent.
After day 12: [x, x, x, x, x, x, x]
It is obvious that we can make two bouquets in different ways.


Example 4:

Input: bloomDay = [1000000000,1000000000], m = 1, k = 1
Output: 1000000000
Explanation: You need to wait 1000000000 days to have a flower ready for a bouquet.


Example 5:

Input: bloomDay = [1,10,2,9,3,8,4,7,5,6], m = 4, k = 2
Output: 9


Constraints:

• bloomDay.length == n
• 1 <= n <= 10^5
• 1 <= bloomDay[i] <= 10^9
• 1 <= m <= 10^6
• 1 <= k <= n

## Solution: Binary Search

Find the smallest day D that we can make at least m bouquets using binary search.

at a given day, we can check how many bouquets we can make in O(n)

Time complexity: O(nlog(max(days))
Space complexity: O(1)

## C++

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