3598: Longest Common Prefix Between Adjacent Strings After Removals

Problem Statement

You are given an array of strings words. For each index i in the range [0, words.length - 1], perform the following steps:

  • Remove the element at index i from the words array.
  • Compute the length of the longest common prefix among all adjacent pairs in the modified array.

Return an array answer, where answer[i] is the length of the longest common prefix between the adjacent pairs after removing the element at index i. If no adjacent pairs remain or if none share a common prefix, then answer[i] should be 0.

Example 1:

Input: words = ["jump","run","run","jump","run"]

Output: [3,0,0,3,3]

Explanation:

  • Removing index 0:
    • words becomes ["run", "run", "jump", "run"]
    • Longest adjacent pair is ["run", "run"] having a common prefix "run" (length 3)
  • Removing index 1:
    • words becomes ["jump", "run", "jump", "run"]
    • No adjacent pairs share a common prefix (length 0)
  • Removing index 2:
    • words becomes ["jump", "run", "jump", "run"]
    • No adjacent pairs share a common prefix (length 0)
  • Removing index 3:
    • words becomes ["jump", "run", "run", "run"]
    • Longest adjacent pair is ["run", "run"] having a common prefix "run" (length 3)
  • Removing index 4:
    • words becomes ["jump", "run", "run", "jump"]
    • Longest adjacent pair is ["run", "run"] having a common prefix "run" (length 3)

Example 2:

Input: words = ["dog","racer","car"]

Output: [0,0,0]

Explanation:

  • Removing any index results in an answer of 0.

Constraints:

  • 1 <= words.length <= 105
  • 1 <= words[i].length <= 104
  • words[i] consists of lowercase English letters.
  • The sum of words[i].length is smaller than or equal 105.

Code Solution