leetcode--18. 4Sum

Given an array S of n integers, are there elements a, b, c, and d in S such that a + b + c + d = target? Find all unique quadruplets in the array which gives the sum of target.

这道题目最主要的关注点：

1. 消除重复pair。

2. 寻找边界条件。

class Solution {
public:
    
    vector<vector<int>> fourSum(vector<int>& nums, int target) {
        vector<int> data;
        data.assign(nums.begin(),nums.end());
        sort(data.begin(), data.end());
        vector<vector<int>> ret;
        
        int len = data.size();
        int max = data[len-1]; //use for margin check;
        
        //test margin
        if(len < 4) return ret;
        

        for(int i = 0; i< len-3; i++){
            if(data[i]*4 > target ) break; //data[i] is too large, needs to stop
            if(data[i] + max*3 < target) continue; //data[i] is too small, need to proceed
            if(i>0 && data[i] == data[i-1]) continue; //use to eliminate duplicate pairs
            
            for(int j = i+1; j<len-2; j++){
                if(data[i] + data[j]*3 > target) break;
                if(data[i] + data[j] + 2*max < target) continue;
                if(j>i+1 && data[j] == data[j-1]) continue;
                
                int subtar = target - data[i] - data[j];
                //Twosum: Two pointer
                int start = j+1;
                int end = len-1;
                if(data[start] + data[start+1] > subtar || data[end] + data[end-1] < subtar) continue;
                while(start<end){
                    int tmp = data[start] + data[end];
                    if( tmp == subtar){
                        ret.push_back({data[i],data[j],data[start],data[end]});
                        while(data[start] == data[start+1] && data[end] == data[end-1] && (start+1) < (end-1)){
                            start++;
                            end--;
                        }//eliminate duplicate pairs.
                        start++;
                        end--;
                    }
                    else {
                        if(tmp > subtar) end--;
                        else start++;
                    }
                }
            }
        }
        return ret;
    }
};