[LeetCode]Longest Valid Parentheses

Given a string containing just the characters '(' and ')', find the length of the longest valid (well-formed) parentheses substring.

For "(()", the longest valid parentheses substring is "()", which has length = 2.

Another example is ")()())", where the longest valid parentheses substring is"()()", which has length = 4. 

LeetCode: https://oj.leetcode.com/problems/longest-valid-parentheses/  

题解：本题要求解最长的连续合法括号对的长度，我们可以将 '(' 的索引 i 保存在一个堆栈中；

当遇到第i个元素为 ')' 时：1. 如果堆栈为空，则说明合法括号对不包含当前的" ) "，我们令合法的开始索引start = i+1

2. 如果堆栈不为空，pop栈顶元素，此时如果堆栈不为空，则合法括号对的长度为i - stack.peek()；此时如果堆栈为空，则合法括号对的长度为 i - start +1

为什么需要记录start？考虑实例"()()"，如果没有记录start，我们将不知道合法括号对的起始索引

代码如下：

public class Solution {
    public int longestValidParentheses(String s) {
        if(s==null || s.length()==0)
        return 0;
    LinkedList<Integer> stack = new LinkedList<Integer>();
    int start = 0;
    int max = 0;
    for(int i=0;i<s.length();i++)
    {
        if(s.charAt(i)=='(')
        {
            stack.push(i);
        }
        else
        {
            if(stack.isEmpty())
            {
                start = i+1;
            }
            else
            {
                stack.pop();
                max = stack.isEmpty()?Math.max(max,i-start+1):Math.max(max,i-stack.peek());
            }
        }
    }
    return max;
    }
}