79. Longest Common Substring

79. Longest Common Substring

Description:

Given two strings, find the longest common substring.

Return the length of it.

Example
Example 1:
Input: “ABCD” and “CBCE”
Output: 2

Explanation:
Longest common substring is "BC"

Example 2:
Input: “ABCD” and “EACB”
Output: 1

Explanation: 
Longest common substring is 'A' or 'C' or 'B'

Challenge
O(n x m) time and memory.

Main Idea:

String Problem. The main idea is to use two pointers as the beginning of two strings. Then compare the longest common string it could be.

Tips/Notes:

1. Be careful to the corner case, the border of two pointers.

Time/Space Cost:

Time Cost: $O(nm)$

Code:

class Solution {
public:
    /**
     * @param A: A string
     * @param B: A string
     * @return: the length of the longest common substring.
     */
    int longestCommonSubstring(string &A, string &B) {
        // write your code here
        int len1 = A.length();
        int len2 = B.length();
        
        if(!len1 || !len2){
            return 0;
        }
        //vector<vector<int>> dp(len1+1, vector<int>(len2+1, 0));
        int res = 0;
        
        for(int k = 0; k < len1; k++){
            for(int m = 0; m < len2; m++){
                int i = k, j = m;
                int tmp = 0;
                
                // Don't forget to the corner case
                while(A[i] == B[j] && j != len2 &&i != len1 ){
                    tmp++;
                    res = (res < tmp)? tmp : res;
                    i++;
                    j++;
                }
            }
            
        }
        return res;
        
    }
};