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2109. Adding Spaces to a String

Description

You are given a 0-indexed string s and a 0-indexed integer array spaces that describes the indices in the original string where spaces will be added. Each space should be inserted before the character at the given index.

  • For example, given s = "EnjoyYourCoffee" and spaces = [5, 9], we place spaces before 'Y' and 'C', which are at indices 5 and 9 respectively. Thus, we obtain "Enjoy Your Coffee".

Return the modified string after the spaces have been added.

 

Example 1:

Input: s = "LeetcodeHelpsMeLearn", spaces = [8,13,15]
Output: "Leetcode Helps Me Learn"
Explanation: 
The indices 8, 13, and 15 correspond to the underlined characters in "LeetcodeHelpsMeLearn".
We then place spaces before those characters.

Example 2:

Input: s = "icodeinpython", spaces = [1,5,7,9]
Output: "i code in py thon"
Explanation:
The indices 1, 5, 7, and 9 correspond to the underlined characters in "icodeinpython".
We then place spaces before those characters.

Example 3:

Input: s = "spacing", spaces = [0,1,2,3,4,5,6]
Output: " s p a c i n g"
Explanation:
We are also able to place spaces before the first character of the string.

 

Constraints:

  • 1 <= s.length <= 3 * 105
  • s consists only of lowercase and uppercase English letters.
  • 1 <= spaces.length <= 3 * 105
  • 0 <= spaces[i] <= s.length - 1
  • All the values of spaces are strictly increasing.

Solutions

Solution 1: Two Pointers

Thinking

Spaces must be inserted at given indices without changing the relative order of \(s\). Inserting into a string in place would shift the suffix repeatedly and can become quadratic.

\(\textit{spaces}\) is increasing, so it can be consumed in lockstep with the indices of \(s\) in linear time.

A pointer \(j\) marks the next space. While scanning \(s\), if the current index equals \(\textit{spaces}[j]\) we append a space first, then the character, and finally join the buffer.

We can use two pointers \(i\) and \(j\) to point to the beginning of the string \(s\) and the array \(\textit{spaces}\), respectively. Then, we iterate through the string \(s\) from the beginning to the end. When \(i\) equals \(\textit{spaces}[j]\), we add a space to the result string, and then increment \(j\) by \(1\). Next, we add \(s[i]\) to the result string, and then increment \(i\) by \(1\). We continue this process until we have iterated through the entire string \(s\).

The time complexity is \(O(n + m)\), and the space complexity is \(O(n + m)\), where \(n\) and \(m\) are the lengths of the string \(s\) and the array \(spaces\), respectively.

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class Solution:
    def addSpaces(self, s: str, spaces: List[int]) -> str:
        ans = []
        j = 0
        for i, c in enumerate(s):
            if j < len(spaces) and i == spaces[j]:
                ans.append(' ')
                j += 1
            ans.append(c)
        return ''.join(ans)
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class Solution {
    public String addSpaces(String s, int[] spaces) {
        StringBuilder ans = new StringBuilder();
        for (int i = 0, j = 0; i < s.length(); ++i) {
            if (j < spaces.length && i == spaces[j]) {
                ans.append(' ');
                ++j;
            }
            ans.append(s.charAt(i));
        }
        return ans.toString();
    }
}
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class Solution {
public:
    string addSpaces(string s, vector<int>& spaces) {
        string ans = "";
        for (int i = 0, j = 0; i < s.size(); ++i) {
            if (j < spaces.size() && i == spaces[j]) {
                ans += ' ';
                ++j;
            }
            ans += s[i];
        }
        return ans;
    }
};
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func addSpaces(s string, spaces []int) string {
    var ans []byte
    for i, j := 0, 0; i < len(s); i++ {
        if j < len(spaces) && i == spaces[j] {
            ans = append(ans, ' ')
            j++
        }
        ans = append(ans, s[i])
    }
    return string(ans)
}
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function addSpaces(s: string, spaces: number[]): string {
    const ans: string[] = [];
    for (let i = 0, j = 0; i < s.length; i++) {
        if (i === spaces[j]) {
            ans.push(' ');
            j++;
        }
        ans.push(s[i]);
    }
    return ans.join('');
}

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