Problem
Given four lists A, B, C, D of integer values, compute how many tuples (i, j, k, l) there are such that A[i] + B[j] + C[k] + D[l] is zero.
To make problem a bit easier, all A, B, C, D have same length of N where 0 ≤ N ≤ 500. All integers are in the range of -228 to 228 - 1 and the result is guaranteed to be at most 231 - 1.
Example:
Input:
A = [ 1, 2]
B = [-2,-1]
C = [-1, 2]
D = [ 0, 2]
__
Output:
2
__
Explanation:
The two tuples are:
1. (0, 0, 0, 1) -> A[0] + B[0] + C[0] + D[1] = 1 + (-2) + (-1) + 2 = 0
2. (1, 1, 0, 0) -> A[1] + B[1] + C[0] + D[0] = 2 + (-1) + (-1) + 0 = 0
Solution
||The naive solution is to run four loops by iterating all elements and check for (A[i] + B[j] + C[k] + d[h]) == 0. Time complexity: N^4.|| ||We can improve solution by iterating through elements of three arrays and check if the fourth array contains A[i] + B[j] + C[k] + d == 0 ----> d = -A[i] - B[j] - C[k]. We can use HashSet to store elements of fourth array. Overall time complexity: N^3;|| ||To improve the solution we can divide arrays into two parts. Then make calculation of sums of one part (A[i] + B[j]) and store their sum’s occurences counter in a HashMap. While calculating second part arrays’ sum (secondSum = C[k] + D[h]) we can check whether map contains secondSum*(-1); A[i] + B[j] == - C[k] - D[h] A[i] + B[j] == - (C[k]+D[h])
class Solution(object):
def fourSumCount(self, A, B, C, D):
"""
:type A: List[int]
:type B: List[int]
:type C: List[int]
:type D: List[int]
:rtype: int
"""
hashtable = {}
for a in A:
for b in B :
hashtable[a+b] = hashtable.get(a+b,0)+1
return sum(hashtable.get(-c-d,0) for c in C for d in D)