Solution for Challenge #1 of AdventJS 2023
Introduction
On December 1st, AdventJS started a series of challenges to practice and improve as a software developer. It consists of a new programming challenge being enabled every day, from December 1st until Christmas on the 25th. 🎄
Challenge Description
In the toy factory of the North Pole, each toy has a unique identification number.
However, due to an error in the toy machine, some numbers have been assigned to more than one toy.
Find the first identification number that has been repeated, where the second occurrence has the smallest index!
In other words, if there is more than one repeated number, you must return the number whose second occurrence appears first in the list. If there are no repeated numbers, return -1.
const giftIds = [2, 1, 3, 5, 3, 2]
const firstRepeatedId = findFirstRepeated(giftIds)
console.log(firstRepeatedId)
const giftIds2 = [1, 2, 3, 4]
const firstRepeatedId2 = findFirstRepeated(giftIds2)
console.log(firstRepeatedId2)
const giftIds3 = [5, 1, 5, 1]
const firstRepeatedId3 = findFirstRepeated(giftIds3)
console.log(firstRepeatedId3)
Watch out! The elves say this is a Google technical test.
Analysis
The goal is to find the first repeated number where the second occurrence of that number has the lowest possible index in the list. If there are no repeated numbers, -1 will be returned.
- A list of integer numbers (gifts), where each number represents a unique identifier of a toy.
Output
Conceptual Analysis
The first repetition needs to be found, so it's not necessary to iterate more than once.
We need an efficient way to keep track of the numbers already checked.
We will stop execution when we find the first repeated number and return it.
Solution
By creating a Set, you can store the repeated values while traversing the array. Each stored element is evaluated, and upon finding a repetition, the answer is returned.
function findFirstRepeated(gifts) {
const set = new Set();
for (const gift of gifts) {
if (set.has(gift)) {
return gift;
}
set.add(gift);
}
return -1;
}
Alternative Solutions
Here are some solutions provided by the community:
Solution by SantiMenendez19
function findFirstRepeated(gifts) {
const repeated = gifts.filter((gift, i) => gifts.indexOf(gift) !== i)
return repeated.length > 0 ? repeated[0] : -1
}
Solution by marta-vilaseca
function findFirstRepeated(gifts) {
const unique = new Set();
for (let i = 0; i < gifts.length; i++) {
if (unique.has(gifts[i])) {
return gifts[i];
} else {
unique.add(gifts[i]);
}
}
return -1;
}
Do you have another alternative? Leave it in the comments!
