753. Cracking the Safe
Hard58.4% acceptance70,515 / 120,781 submissions
Asked by 1 company
Topics
There is a safe protected by a password. The password is a sequence of n digits where each digit can be in the range [0, k - 1].
The safe has a peculiar way of checking the password. When you enter in a sequence, it checks the most recent n digits that were entered each time you type a digit.
- For example, the correct password is
"345"and you enter in"012345":- After typing
0, the most recent3digits is"0", which is incorrect. - After typing
1, the most recent3digits is"01", which is incorrect. - After typing
2, the most recent3digits is"012", which is incorrect. - After typing
3, the most recent3digits is"123", which is incorrect. - After typing
4, the most recent3digits is"234", which is incorrect. - After typing
5, the most recent3digits is"345", which is correct and the safe unlocks.
- After typing
Return any string of minimum length that will unlock the safe at some point of entering it.
Example 1:
Input: n = 1, k = 2 Output: "10" Explanation: The password is a single digit, so enter each digit. "01" would also unlock the safe.
Example 2:
Input: n = 2, k = 2 Output: "01100" Explanation: For each possible password: - "00" is typed in starting from the 4th digit. - "01" is typed in starting from the 1st digit. - "10" is typed in starting from the 3rd digit. - "11" is typed in starting from the 2nd digit. Thus "01100" will unlock the safe. "10011", and "11001" would also unlock the safe.
Constraints:
1 <= n <= 41 <= k <= 101 <= kn <= 4096
Hints
Hint 1
We can think of this problem as the problem of finding an Euler path (a path visiting every edge exactly once) on the following graph: there are
kn-1 nodes with each node having k edges. It turns out this graph always has an Eulerian circuit (path starting where it ends.)
We should visit each node in "post-order" so as to not get stuck in the graph prematurely.