LintCode 14. First Position of Target

题目

For a given sorted array (ascending order) and a target number, find the first index of this number in O(log n) time complexity.
If the target number does not exist in the array, return -1.
Have you met this question in a real interview?
Yes
Example
If the array is [1, 2, 3, 3, 4, 5, 10], for given target 3, return 2.
Challenge
If the count of numbers is bigger than 2^32, can your code work properly?
Tags
Array Binary Search

思路

水题。二分，用res记录下来最左index即可。

代码

class Solution:
    # @param nums: The integer array
    # @param target: Target number to find
    # @return the first position of target in nums, position start from 0 
    def binarySearch(self, nums, target):
        # write your code here
        start = 0; end = len(nums) - 1
        res = -1
        while start <= end:
            mid = start + (end - start) // 2
            if nums[mid] == target:
                res = mid
                end = mid - 1
            elif nums[mid] < target:
                start = mid + 1
            else:
                end = mid - 1
        return res