LeetCode 153: Find Minimum in Rotated Sorted Array

Suppose an array sorted in ascending order is rotated at some pivot unknown to you beforehand.

(i.e., [0,1,2,4,5,6,7] might become [4,5,6,7,0,1,2]).

Find the minimum element.

You may assume no duplicate exists in the array.

Example 1:

Input: [3,4,5,1,2] 
Output: 1

Example 2:

Input: [4,5,6,7,0,1,2]
Output: 0

1 Iteration

class Solution:
    def findMin(self, nums: 'List[int]') -> 'int':
        l, r = 0, len(nums) - 1
        while l < r:
            mid = (l+r)//2
            if nums[mid] < nums[r]:
                r = mid
            elif nums[mid] > nums[r]:
                l = mid + 1
            else:
                r -= 1
                
        return nums[l]

2 Recursion

class Solution:
    def findMin(self, nums: 'List[int]') -> 'int':
        def recursion(nums, l, r):
            if l < r:
                mid = (l+r)//2
                if nums[mid] < nums[r]:
                    r = mid
                elif nums[mid] > nums[r]:
                    l = mid + 1
                else:
                    r -= 1
                return recursion(nums, l, r)
            else:
                return nums[l]
    	return recursion(nums, 0, len(nums) - 1)