Description
Find any position of a target number in a sorted array. Return -1 if target does not exist.
Example
Given [1, 2, 2, 4, 5, 5]
.
For target = 2
, return 1 or 2.
For target = 5
, return 4 or 5.
For target = 6
, return -1.
Challenge
O(logn) time
Solution
这个是经典的二分法问题,返回有序数组中的目标值位置,此题作为二分法的模板。注意循环的条件为while(start + 1 < end),这样做的好处是当求 Last Positon of Target 时仍然可以用这个模板。
java
public class Solution {
/*
* @param nums: An integer array sorted in ascending order
* @param target: An integer
* @return: An integer
*/
public int findPosition(int[] nums, int target) {
// write your code here
if (nums == null || nums.length == 0) {
return -1;
}
int start = 0, end = nums.length - 1;
// 要点1:start + 1 < end 避免死循环,适用于找到最后一个target位置的问题
//相邻就退出循环
//start = 1, end = 2 就要退出循环
while (start + 1 < end) {
// 要点3:避免溢出
//int mid = (start + end) / 2
//start,end 近似 2^31 时,相加就会越界
int mid = start + (end - start) / 2;
if (nums[mid] == target) {
return mid;
} else if (nums[mid] < target) {
// 要点4:可以不+1或-1,节省思维复杂度
// or start = mid + 1;
start = mid;
} else {
// or end = mid - 1;
end = mid;
}
}
// 要点2:由于前一步两个数就退出循环,因此需要再次额外判断start或end是否为target
//double check
if (nums[start] == target) {
return start;
}
if (nums[end] == target) {
return end;
}
return -1;
}
}