Leetcode Edit Distance

Given two words word1 and word2, find the minimum number of steps required to convert word1 to word2. (each operation is counted as 1 step.)

You have the following 3 operations permitted on a word:

a) Insert a character
b) Delete a character
c) Replace a character

Difficulty: Hard

Solution: Tricky DP

public class Solution {
    public int minDistance(String word1, String word2) {
        int len1 = word1.length(), len2 = word2.length();
        int[][] nums = new int[len1 + 1][len2 + 1];
        for(int i = 0; i <= len1; i++){
            nums[i][0] = i;
        }
        for(int j = 0; j <= len2; j++){
            nums[0][j] = j;
        }
        for(int i = 1; i <= len1; i++){
            for(int j = 1; j <= len2; j++){
                if(word1.charAt(i - 1) == word2.charAt(j - 1)){
                    nums[i][j] = nums[i-1][j-1];
                }
                else{
                    nums[i][j] = Math.min(nums[i-1][j-1], Math.min(nums[i][j-1], nums[i-1][j])) + 1;
                }
            }
        }
        return nums[len1][len2];
    }
}