LeetCode 38. Count and Say(java)

The count-and-say sequence is the sequence of integers with the first five terms as following:

1. 1
2. 11
3. 21
4. 1211
5. 111221
   1 is read off as “one 1” or 11.
   11 is read off as “two 1s” or 21.
   21 is read off as “one 2, then one 1” or 1211.
   Given an integer n, generate the nth term of the count-and-say sequence.

Note: Each term of the sequence of integers will be represented as a string.

Example 1:
Input: 1
Output: "1"

Example 2:
Input: 4
Output: "1211"

用归纳法的思想，假设我们已经得到了n-1的res，然后我们去得到n的res，在得到n的res的过程中，我们需要假设0 ~ i-1已经完成，那么i的时候，分情况判断，res.charAt(i) == res.charAt(i-1)和res.charAt(i) != res.charAt(i - 1). 注意想清楚i = 0，i = 1, i = 2之间的关系。由于要得到第n个，我们需要求出从1~n，另外每求一个1~n之间的数，都要循环从0 ~ s.length() - 1。

public String countAndSay(int n) {
        //special case
        if (n <= 0) return "";
        if (n == 1) return "1";
        //base case
        StringBuilder s = new StringBuilder("1");
        //general case
        for (int i = 2; i <= n; i++) {
            StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder();
            int count = 1;
            for (int j = 1; j < s.length(); j++) {
                if (s.charAt(j) == s.charAt(j - 1)) {
                    count++;
                } else {
                    sb.append(count);
                    sb.append(s.charAt(j - 1));
                    count = 1;
                }
            }
            sb.append(count);
            sb.append(s.charAt(s.length() - 1));
            s = sb;
        }           
        return s.toString();
    }