How to Solve Change Minimum Characters to Satisfy One of Three Conditions Problem
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Change Minimum Characters to Satisfy One of Three Conditions
You are given two strings a and b that consist of lowercase letters. In one operation, you can change any character in a or b to any lowercase letter. Your goal is to satisfy one of the following thre...
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Understanding the Change Minimum Characters to Satisfy One of Three Conditions Problem
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Problem Statement
You are given two strings a and b that consist of lowercase letters. In one operation, you can change any character in a or b to any lowercase letter. Your goal is to satisfy one of the following three conditions: Every letter in a is strictly less than every letter in b in the alphabet. Every letter in b is strictly less than every letter in a in the alphabet. Both a and b consist of only one distinct letter. Return the minimum number of operations needed to achieve your goal.
Change Minimum Characters to Satisfy One of Three Conditions
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Examples
a = "aba", b = "caa"
2
Consider the best way to make each condition true: 1) Change b to "ccc" in 2 operations, then every letter in a is less than every letter in b. 2) Change a to "bbb" and b to "aaa" in 3 operations, then every letter in b is less than every letter in a. 3) Change a to "aaa" and b to "aaa" in 2 operations, then a and b consist of one distinct letter. The best way was done in 2 operations (either condition 1 or condition 3).
a = "dabadd", b = "cda"
3
The best way is to make condition 1 true by changing b to "eee".
Constraints
1 <= a.length, b.length <= 105
a and b consist only of lowercase letters.
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