704. Binary Search

题目

Given a sorted (in ascending order) integer array nums of n elements and a target value, write a function to search target in nums. If target exists, then return its index, otherwise return -1.

Example 1:

Input: nums = [-1,0,3,5,9,12], target = 9
Output: 4
Explanation: 9 exists in nums and its index is 4

我的想法

二分法～

class Solution {
    public int search(int[] nums, int target) {
        if(nums == null || nums.length == 0) {
            return -1;
        }
        
        int start = 0, end = nums.length - 1;
        while(start <= end) {
            int mid = (start + end) / 2;
            if(target == nums[mid]) {
                return mid;
            }
            if(target < nums[mid]) {
                end = mid - 1;
            } 
            if(target > nums[mid]) {
                start = mid + 1;
            }
        }
        return -1;
    }
}

解答

jiuzhang solution:
写法不大一样，这里考虑了重复元素。注意这里用的是start + 1 < end。在有相同元素例子中，比如：nums = [1, 1] target = 1
此时start = 0, end = 1, mid = 0。如果题目是取寻找最后一个target，则当nums[mid] == target，会使start = mid，即还是等于0，一直死循环

class Solution {
    public int search(int[] nums, int target) {
        if(nums == null || nums.length == 0) {
            return -1;
        }
        
        int start = 0, end = nums.length - 1;
        //using start + 1 to avoid infinite loop
        while(start + 1 < end) {
            //avoid overflow
            int mid = start + (end - start) / 2;
            if(nums[mid] == target) {
                //find the first target
                end = mid;
            } else if (nums[mid] < target) {
                start = mid + 1;
            } else {
                end = mid - 1;
            }
        }
        if(nums[start] == target) {
            return start;
        }
        if(nums[end] == target) {
            return end;
        }
        return -1;
    }
}