花花酱 LeetCode 1003. Check If Word Is Valid After Substitutions

We are given that the string "abc" is valid.

From any valid string V, we may split V into two pieces X and Y such that X + Y (X concatenated with Y) is equal to V.  (X or Y may be empty.)  Then, X + "abc" + Y is also valid.

If for example S = "abc", then examples of valid strings are: "abc", "aabcbc", "abcabc", "abcabcababcc".  Examples of invalid strings are: "abccba", "ab", "cababc", "bac".

Return true if and only if the given string S is valid.

Example 1:

Input: "aabcbc"
Output: true
Explanation: 
We start with the valid string "abc".
Then we can insert another "abc" between "a" and "bc", resulting in "a" + "abc" + "bc" which is "aabcbc".

Example 2:

Input: "abcabcababcc"
Output: true
Explanation: 
"abcabcabc" is valid after consecutive insertings of "abc".
Then we can insert "abc" before the last letter, resulting in "abcabcab" + "abc" + "c" which is "abcabcababcc".

Example 3:

Input: "abccba"
Output: false

Example 4:

Input: "cababc"
Output: false

Note:

1. 1 <= S.length <= 20000
2. S[i] is 'a', 'b', or 'c'

Solution: Stack

If current char can be appended to the stack do so, if the top of stack is “abc” pop, otherwise push the current char to the stack. Check whether the stack is empty after all chars were processed.

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