Leetcode 230. Kth Smallest Element in a BST

Problem

Given the root of a binary search tree, and an integer k, return the kth smallest value (1-indexed) of all the values of the nodes in the tree.

Algorithm

Traverse the tree inorder, store the corresponding number, and return the kth number.

Code

# Definition for a binary tree node.
# class TreeNode:
#     def __init__(self, val=0, left=None, right=None):
#         self.val = val
#         self.left = left
#         self.right = right
class Solution:
    def kthSmallest(self, root: Optional[TreeNode], k: int) -> int:
        ans = []
        def visit(root):
            nonlocal ans
            if root.left:
                visit(root.left)
            ans.append(root.val)
            if root.right:
                visit(root.right)
        
        visit(root) 
        return ans[k-1]