How to Solve Avoid Flood in The City Problem
Master the Avoid Flood in The City LeetCode problem with undetectable real-time assistance. Get instant solutions and explanations during your coding interviews.
Interview Coder generates complete solutions and debugging hints that you can use while explaining your approach, so you stay calm and in control.
Avoid Flood in The City
Your country has an infinite number of lakes. Initially, all the lakes are empty, but when it rains over the nth lake, the nth lake becomes full of water. If it rains over a lake that is full of water...
Interview Coder will help you solve this problem in real-time during your interview
✨ Get instant solutions, explanations, and code generation
Understanding the Avoid Flood in The City Problem
Let's break down this LeetCode problem and understand what makes it challenging in interview settings.
Problem Statement
Your country has an infinite number of lakes. Initially, all the lakes are empty, but when it rains over the nth lake, the nth lake becomes full of water. If it rains over a lake that is full of water, there will be a flood. Your goal is to avoid floods in any lake. Given an integer array rains where: rains[i] > 0 means there will be rains over the rains[i] lake. rains[i] == 0 means there are no rains this day and you can choose one lake this day and dry it. Return an array ans where: ans.length == rains.length ans[i] == -1 if rains[i] > 0. ans[i] is the lake you choose to dry in the ith day if rains[i] == 0. If there are multiple valid answers return any of them. If it is impossible to avoid flood return an empty array. Notice that if you chose to dry a full lake, it becomes empty, but if you chose to dry an empty lake, nothing changes.
Avoid Flood in The City
Related Topics
How Interview Coder Helps
Get real-time assistance for Avoid Flood in The City problems during coding interviews. Interview Coder provides instant solutions and explanations.
Examples
rains = [1,2,3,4]
[-1,-1,-1,-1]
After the first day full lakes are [1] After the second day full lakes are [1,2] After the third day full lakes are [1,2,3] After the fourth day full lakes are [1,2,3,4] There's no day to dry any lake and there is no flood in any lake.
rains = [1,2,0,0,2,1]
[-1,-1,2,1,-1,-1]
After the first day full lakes are [1] After the second day full lakes are [1,2] After the third day, we dry lake 2. Full lakes are [1] After the fourth day, we dry lake 1. There is no full lakes. After the fifth day, full lakes are [2]. After the sixth day, full lakes are [1,2]. It is easy that this scenario is flood-free. [-1,-1,1,2,-1,-1] is another acceptable scenario.
rains = [1,2,0,1,2]
[]
After the second day, full lakes are [1,2]. We have to dry one lake in the third day. After that, it will rain over lakes [1,2]. It's easy to prove that no matter which lake you choose to dry in the 3rd day, the other one will flood.
Constraints
1 <= rains.length <= 105
0 <= rains[i] <= 109
How Interview Coder Helps with Leetcode Problems
Trust anchors reduce friction for conversion. Reinforce undetectability claims, platform compatibility, user counts, and the free trial to remove perceived risk.
See Interview Coder in Action
Watch how Interview Coder helps solve LeetCode problems during live interviews
Undetectability Checklist
Platform Compatibility
User results and traction
More than 87,000 developers use Interview Coder and early launch metrics showed rapid adoption. Social proof signals that this approach helps real candidates land offers across a range of companies.
Undetectability and technical details
Our native desktop architecture avoids common detection vectors used by browser extensions. We provide a clear checklist so you can run basic checks and confirm the app will be invisible during live interviews.
Platform compatibility and limitations
We work with Zoom, HackerRank, CodeSignal, CoderPad and other web based platforms, with a known list of app version caveats. Check the compatibility note and request a browser link if a specific desktop app is unsupported.
Frequently Asked Questions
Common questions about solving Avoid Flood in The City and using Interview Coder during coding interviews.
Interview Coder generates complete solutions instantly with proper complexity analysis, letting you focus on explaining your approach and demonstrating problem-solving skills rather than getting stuck on implementation details during high-pressure situations.
Ready to Get Started?
Download Interview Coder now and join thousands of developers who have aced their coding interviews