LeetCode #75 - Sort Colors - Dutch national flag problem

LeetCode #75 - Sort Colors

Description

Given an array with n objects colored red, white or blue, sort them in-place so that objects of the same color are adjacent, with the colors in the order red, white and blue.

Here, we will use the integers 0, 1, and 2 to represent the color red, white, and blue respectively.

Notes:

• You are not suppose to use the library’s sort function for this problem.
• A rather straight forward solution is a two-pass algorithm using counting sort.First, iterate the array counting number of 0’s, 1’s, and 2’s, then overwrite array with total number of 0’s, then 1’s and followed by 2’s.
• Could you come up with a one-pass algorithm using only constant space?

Sample I/O

Input: [2,0,2,1,1,0]

Output: [0,0,1,1,2,2]

Key methods

It’s a Dutch national flag problem.

1. Initially put all the balls into the unclassified category.
2. Loop until the all balls of different color are in the right categories.

Solution in Python (from discussion)

class Solution:
    def sortColors(self, nums):
    	
    	red, white, blue = 0, 0, len(nums)-1
    
    	while white <= blue:
   		""" swap the red and white to make it classified """
	        if nums[white] == 0:
	            nums[red], nums[white] = nums[white], nums[red]
	            white += 1
	            red += 1
            	""" already classfied """
	        elif nums[white] == 1:
	            white += 1
	        """ swap the blue and white to make it classified """
	        else:
	            nums[white], nums[blue] = nums[blue], nums[white]
	            blue -= 1       

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