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Codility sample question

Started by Alpha_ProgDes Dec 25, 2010 at 9:34 AM 0 replies 3.5k views

Original Post

Dec 25, 2010 at 9:34 AM

I tried to post in the other two threads about it, but they're retired.
So long story, short. Why is this wrong? I didn't see the sample array they used to test the code so I had to go by was the sample array they had.

int equi ( int[] A ) {    long equiIndex = -1;    long equiTotal = 0;        if (A.Length == 0)    {        return (int)equiIndex;    }        if (A == null)    {        return (int)equiIndex;    }        foreach (int i in A)    {        equiTotal += i;    }        for (long j = 0; j < A.Length; ++j)    {         if (A[j] == - (equiTotal - A[j]))        {            equiIndex = j;            break; //even with this still wrong        }    }        return (int)equiIndex; }

[Edited by - Alpha_ProgDes on December 25, 2010 9:54:54 AM]

ApochPiQ

Dec 25, 2010 at 11:00 AM

I can see a few problems offhand:

A.Length is accessed before checking if A is null (crash)

Cast from long to int may fail for very large arrays

The algorithm is wrong. Think carefully about what you're trying to do (find the equilibrium index, i.e. the sum of the first chunk of the array equals the sum of the remainder of the array) and compare this to what you're actually testing for.

This might be easier if you compare to the actual solutions provided in other languages here (even if you don't know Python, understanding the algorithm should be trivial).

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