Detect anagram in matrix
Last updated: July 19, 2025
Quick Overview
Given a 2D matrix of characters and a string, write a function to detect all occurrences of the string's anagrams within the matrix. The function should return the starting coordinates (row, column) of each found anagram in the matrix. An anagram is defined as a rearrangement of the characters in the string, and the search should consider all possible horizontal and vertical directions.
Palantir
July 19, 20256
7
4,207 solved
Given a 2D matrix of characters and a string, write a function to detect all occurrences of the string's anagrams within the matrix. The function should return the starting coordinates (row, column) of each found anagram in the matrix. An anagram is defined as a rearrangement of the characters in the string, and the search should consider all possible horizontal and vertical directions.
Palantir uses this problem in the Take-home Project to evaluate your algorithmic thinking. They expect you to discuss multiple approaches, analyze trade-offs between them, and implement the optimal solution with clean, readable code.
What the Interviewer Expects
- Identify the correct data structure and algorithm for the problem
- Write clean, bug-free code with proper variable naming
- Analyze time and space complexity correctly
- Handle basic edge cases (empty input, single element)
- Communicate your thought process while coding
Key Topics to Cover
How to Approach This
- Clarify input constraints and edge cases before writing code.
- Walk through your approach verbally and confirm with the interviewer before coding.
- Start with a brute force solution, then optimize. Mention time and space complexity.
- Test your solution with examples, including edge cases like empty input or duplicates.
- Consider common patterns: sliding window, two pointers, hash map, BFS/DFS, dynamic programming.
Possible Follow-up Questions
- What is the worst-case input for your solution?
- What if the input doesn't fit in memory?
- What happens if the input contains duplicates?
- How would you parallelize this solution?
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Practice DSA ProblemsSample Answer
Problem Analysis
The problem requires us to detect all occurrences of anagrams of a given string within a 2D matrix of characters. The key observation is that anagrams are defined by their character counts rather than...
Approach
- Character Counting: Create a frequency dictionary for the target string. For example, for the string 'abc', the frequency dictionary is {'a': 1, 'b': 1, 'c': 1}.
- Horizontal Search: For...
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