There are N gas stations along a circular route, where the amount of gas at station i is gas[i]
.
You have a car with an unlimited gas tank and it costs cost[i]
of gas to travel from station i to its next station (i+1). You begin the journey with an empty tank at one of the gas stations.
Return the starting gas station's index if you can travel around the circuit once, otherwise return -1.
Difficulty: Medium
Solution: tricky greedy problem
To solve this problem, we need to understand and use the following 2 facts:
1) if the sum of gas >= the sum of cost, then the circle can be completed.
2) if A can not reach C in a the sequence of A-->B-->C, then B can not make it either.
public class Solution {
public int canCompleteCircuit(int[] gas, int[] cost) {
int len = gas.length;
int ans = 0, remaining = 0, totalRemaining = 0;
for(int i = 0; i < len; i++){
totalRemaining += gas[i] - cost[i];
if(remaining < 0){
ans = i;
remaining = gas[i] - cost[i];
}
else{
remaining += gas[i] - cost[i];
}
}
if(remaining < 0 || totalRemaining < 0) return -1;
return ans;
}
}